Strategies for assessing the reading and listening skills of a2 level students - Английский язык - Курсовые работы

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Strategies for assessing the reading and listening skills of a2 level students

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Strategies for assessing the reading and listening skills of a2 level students Table of contents Introduction………………………………………………………….….…3-5 Chapter I The General Characteristics of Assessing Reading Comprehension 1.1 Reading Purpose and Reading Comprehension Approaches to Correcting Mistakes ………………...……………………………….……6-8 1.2 Goals and Techniques for Assessing Reading Comprehension. Problems in reading Comprehension ……………………………………………..…9-12 1.3 Reading Comprehension Strategies……………………………….…13-15 Chapter II. The principles of assessing listening comprehension 2. 1. Reasons for assessing listening……………….……………………28-29 2.2. Principles for developing listening ability………………………….30-31 2.3. The structure of listening comprehension and types of activities…32-33 2.4.. Listening as a stimulus to other a

Introduction What is reading? Reading is about understanding written texts. It is a complex activity that involves both perception and thought. Reading consists of two related processes: word recognition and comprehension. Word recognition refers to the process of perceiving how written symbols correspond to one’s spoken language. Comprehension is the process of making sense of words, sentences and connected text. Readers typically make use of background knowledge, vocabulary, grammatical knowledge, experience with text and other strategies to help them understand written text. Researchs and classroom practices support the use of a balanced approach in teaching reading comprehension. Because reading comprehension depends on efficient word recognition and comprehension, instruction should d

Instead of using the prior read-test method, research studies have concluded that there are much more effective ways to teach comprehension. Much work has been done in the area of teaching novice readers a bank of «reading strategies,» or tools to interpret and analyze text. There is not a definitive set of strategies, but common ones include summarizing what you have read, monitoring your reading to make sure it is still making sense, and analyzing the structure of the text (e.g., the use of headings in science text). Some programs teach students how to self monitor whether they are understanding and provide students with tools for fixing comprehension problems. The aim the theme is to analyze the existent problems in teaching reading comprehension and find the ways out of this problem by

authentic: Students should read the text in a way that matches the reading purpose, the type of text, and the way people normally read. This means that reading aloud will take place only in situations where it would take place outside the classroom, such as reading for pleasure. The majority of students' reading should be done silently. Students do not learn to read by reading aloud. A person who reads aloud and comprehends the meaning of the text is coordinating word recognition with comprehension and speaking and pronunciation ability in highly complex ways. Students whose language skills are limited are not able to process at this level, and end up having to drop one or more of the elements. Usually the dropped element is comprehension, and reading aloud becomes word calling: simply

its laborious construction, another format is constructed known as criterion based Informal Reading Inventory. Chapter I The General Characteristics of Teaching Reading Comprehension 1.1 Reading Purpose and Reading Comprehension Traditionally, the purpose of learning to read in a language has been to have access to the literature written in that language. In language instruction, reading materials have traditionally been chosen from literary texts that represent «higher» forms of culture. 4 This approach assumes that students learn to read a language by studying its vocabulary, grammar, and sentence structure, not by actually reading it. In this approach, lower level learners read only sentences and paragraphs generated by textbook writers and instructors. The reading of authentic material

texts.The purpose for reading also determines the appropriate approach to reading comprehension. A person who needs to know whether she can afford to eat at a particular restaurant needs to comprehend the pricing information provided on the menu, but does not need to recognize the name of every appetizer listed. A person reading poetry for enjoyment needs to recognize the words the poet uses and the ways they are put together, but does not need to identify main idea and supporting details. However, a person using a scientific article to support an opinion needs to know the vocabulary that is used, understand the facts and cause-effect sequences that are presented, and recognize ideas that are presented as hypotheses and givens. Reading research shows that good readers  Read extensively 

paragraphs that encode meaning. The reader uses knowledge, skills, and strategies to determine what that meaning is. Reader knowledge, skills, and strategies include  Linguistic competence: the ability to recognize the elements of the writing system; knowledge of vocabulary; knowledge of how words are structured into sentences  Discourse competence: knowledge of discourse markers and how they connect parts of the text to one another  Sociolinguistic competence: knowledge about different types of texts and their usual structure and content  Strategic competence: the ability to use top-down strategies, as well as knowledge of the language (a bottom-up strategy) The purpose(s) for reading and the type of text determine the specific knowledge, skills, and strategies that readers need to ap

1.2 Goals and Techniques for Teaching Reading Comprehension Instructors want to produce students who, even if they do not have complete control of the grammar or an extensive lexicon, can fend for themselves in communication situations. In the case of reading, this means producing students who can use reading strategies to maximize their comprehension of text, identify relevant and non-relevant information, and tolerate less than word-by-word comprehension. The Reading Process To accomplish this goal, instructors focus on the process of reading rather than on its product.  They develop students' awareness of the reading process and reading strategies by asking students to think and talk about how they read in their native language.  They allow students to practice the full repertoire

situations they may encounter beyond the classroom. In this way they give their students the foundation for communicative competence in the new language. Integrating Reading Comprehension Strategies 6 Instruction in reading comprehension strategies is not an add-on, but rather an integral part of the use of reading activities in the language classroom. Instructors can help their students become effective readers by teaching them how to use strategies before, during, and after reading. Before reading: Plan for the reading task  Set a purpose or decide in advance what to read for  Decide if more linguistic or background knowledge is needed  Determine whether to enter the text from the top down (attend to the overall meaning) or from the bottom up (focus on the words and phrases) During an

When selecting texts for student assignments, remember that the difficulty of a reading text is less a function of the language, and more a function of the conceptual difficulty and the task(s) that students are expected to complete. Simplifying a text by changing the language often removes natural redundancy and makes the organization somewhat difficult for students to predict. This actually makes a text more difficult to read than if the original were used. Rather than simplifying a text by changing its language, make it more approachable by eliciting students' existing knowledge in pre-reading discussion, reviewing new vocabulary before reading, and asking students to perform tasks that are within their competence, such as skimming to get the main idea or scanning for specific infor

series of words without regard for the meaning they carry individually and together. Word calling is not productive for the student who is doing it, and it is boring for other students to listen to.  There are two ways to use reading aloud productively in the language classroom. Read aloud to your students as they follow along silently. You have the ability to use inflection and tone to help them hear what the text is saying. Following along as you read will help students move from word-by-word reading to reading in phrases and thought units, as they do in their first language.  Use the «read and look up» technique. With this technique, a student reads a phrase or sentence silently as many times as necessary, then looks up (away from the text) and tells you what the phrase or sentence sa

1.3 Reading Comprehension Strategies Reading comprehension is defined as the level of understanding of a passage or text. Reading at the rate of 200 to 220 words per minute is considered as a normal speed of reading. For normal reading rates 75% is an acceptable level of comprehension. That means if a student can understand the meaning of at least 75% of the total text given then it is regarded as acceptable limits for reading comprehension. Reading is an active process that require an interplay between various types of knowledge. According to Canale and Swain’s model of communicative competence, listeners and readers draw upon four types of competencies as they attempt to comprehend an oral or written message. Readers rely upon the types of knowledge described above as they perform a vari

4. It helps to link the event of narration with our previous experiences and predict the next probable event in the course based on the information given in the narration. Testing Testing Comprehension reading has always proved a great tool in the assessment of the student’ ability as it provides a feedback on the progress of student. It also enhances the self ability to judge ourselves, provided such tests are carefully designed. The carefully designed comprehension test is a cleverly constructed set of questions targeted at the summery, overall meaning of text including most important meanings of words. The questionnaire can be of different types like open ended question, closed formats or multiple choice questions. Thus introduced the Informal Reading Inventories (IRI), which is a class

In addition, in 1995, Manzo and McKenna developed an innovation as Informal Reading-Thinking Inventory, which is aimed at other related areas like thinking development of student besides his word decoding and comprehension accuracy power. It is format which facilitates additional measuring tool of higher cognitive progress and comprehension. It measures the progress on three levels – how good the student in reading lines, reading between lines and reading beyond the lines (recognition, inference and its interpretation and application). The most significant aspect of the IR-TI is the separate judgment it makes of basic comprehension and separately of critical-constructive comprehension. Informal Reading and Thinking Inventory (IR-TI) provides a set of graded word lists where each list is co

Problems in Reading Comprehension Proficient reading depends on the ability to recognize words quickly and effortlessly. If word recognition is difficult, students use too much of their processing capacity to read individual words, which interferes with their ability to comprehend what is read. Few would dispute the claim that comprehension is necessary in order for language acquisition to occur. In order to communicate effectively, learners must understand what is being said. To function successfully with a target language, learners depend upon their ability to comprehend the spoken and written word. Empirical studies have identified a positive relationship between listening ability and language acquisition as well as between reading ability and language acquisition. During the last cent

Instruction in comprehension strategy use often involves the gradual release of responsibility, wherein teachers initially explain and model strategies. Over time, they give students more and more responsibility for using the strategies until they can use them independently. This technique is generally associated with the idea of self-regulation and reflects social cognitive theory, originally conceptualized by Albert Bandura Comprehension is the ultimate goal of reading. However, there are a number of factors which may interfere with an individual's ability to comprehend text material. The most common single obstacle to text comprehension is decoding insufficiency. Simply put, if the student cannot decode accurately and automatically, comprehension will be compromised. – When the st

strong but begin to experience learning difficulty in the higher grades should be evaluated for underlying deficits in comprehension. Physiological vision problems, such as deficits in tracking and scanning, also interfere with comprehension of text. For example, if one were asked to read Gone with the Wind through a straw, the physical energy to perform the task would result in extreme fatigue, diminished attention and poor comprehension. Comprehension problems in this case would not be due to specific learning disability but to a sensory-based (and likely correctable) vision problem. Lastly, psychological problems can also impair comprehension. Therefore, a comprehensive psychoeducational evaluation should be performed whenever a person experiences problems with text comprehension. Only

In addition to the main purpose for reading, an activity can also have one or more instructional purposes, such as practicing or reviewing specific grammatical constructions, introducing new vocabulary, or familiarizing students with the typical structure of a certain type of text. Check the level of difficulty of the text The factors listed below can help you judge the relative ease or difficulty of a reading text for a particular purpose and a particular group of students. • How is the information organized? Does the story line, narrative, or instruction conform to familiar expectations? Texts in which the events are presented in natural chronological order, which have an informative title, and which present the information following an obvious organization (main ideas first, details and

• Assess students' background knowledge of the topic and linguistic content of the text • Give students the background knowledge necessary for comprehension of the text, or activate the existing knowledge that the students possess • Clarify any cultural information which may be necessary to comprehend the passage • Make students aware of the type of text they will be reading and the purpose(s) for reading • Provide opportunities for group or collaborative work and for class discussion activities Sample pre-reading activities: • Using the title, subtitles, and divisions within the text to predict content and organization or sequence of information • Looking at pictures, maps, diagrams, or graphs and their captions • Talking about the author's background, writing style, and usual top

In while-reading activities, students check their comprehension as they read. The purpose for reading determines the appropriate type and level of comprehension. • When reading for specific information, students need to ask themselves, have I obtained the information I was looking for? • When reading for pleasure, students need to ask themselves, Do I understand the story line/sequence of ideas well enough to enjoy reading this? • When reading for thorough understanding (intensive reading), students need to ask themselves, Do I understand each main idea and how the author supports it? Does what I'm reading agree with my predictions, and, if not, how does it differ? To check comprehension in this situation, students may • Stop at the end of each section to review and check their predict

Another problem with textbook reading selections is that they have been adapted to a predetermined reading level through adjustment of vocabulary, grammar, and sentence length. This makes them more immediately approachable, but it also means that they are less authentic and do not encourage students to apply the reading strategies they will need to use outside of class. When this is the case, use the textbook reading selection as a starting point to introduce a writer or topic, and then give students choices of more challenging authentic texts to read as a follow up. Assessing Reading Proficiency Reading ability is very difficult to assess accurately. In the communicative competence model, a student's reading level is the level at which that student is able to use reading to accomplish

Instructors often use comprehension questions to test whether students have understood what they have read. In order to test comprehension appropriately, these questions need to be coordinated with the purpose for reading. If the purpose is to find specific information, comprehension questions should focus on that information. If the purpose is to understand an opinion and the arguments that support it, comprehension questions should ask about those points. In everyday reading situations, readers have a purpose for reading before they start. That is, they know what comprehension questions they are going to need to answer before they begin reading. To make reading assessment in the language classroom more like reading outside of the classroom, therefore, allow students to review the compreh

Approaches to Correcting Mistakes In teaching students to read the teacher must do once best to prevent mistakes. Teachers may however, be certain that in spite of much work done by them, students will make mistakes in reading. The question is who corrects their mistakes, how they should be corrected, when they must be corrected.opinion is that the student who has made a mistake must try to correct it himself/herself. If s/he cannot do it, his/her classmates correct his/her mistake. If they cannot do so the teacher corrects the mistake. The following techniques may be suggested: . The teacher writes a word (e. g., black) on the black board. S/He underlines ck in it and asks the pupil to say what sound these two letters convey. If the student cannot answer the question, the teacher ask

. The teacher or one of the students says: Find the word „ чорний " and read it. The student finds the word and reads it either without any mistake if his/her first mistake was due to his/her carelessness, or s/he repeats the mistake. The teacher then tells him/her to recollect the rule and read the word correctly. . The teacher corrects the mistake himself/herself. The student reads the word correctly. The teacher asks the student to explain to the class how to read ck . The teacher tells the student to write the word black and underline ck. Then s/he says how the word is read.are some other ways of correcting students' mistakes. The teacher should use them reasonably and choose the one most suitable for the case.question arises: whether teachers should correct a mistake in the

To make teaching reading effective it is advisable to focus on one skill at a time, explain the purpose of given tasks, establish connection with the previously acquired knowledge and skills, make usage of visual and audio aids, discuss problematic issues etc. Teachers should also keep in mind that reading is not a passive skill, make students engaged with what they are reading, encouraged them to respond to the content of a reading text not just to the language, to make sure that tasks correspond to the topic and level of the students etc. All in all, there are six important methods of teaching reading and they are as follows: 1. the alphabetic method / ABC method / spelling method, 2. the phonic method, 3. the word method, 4. the phrase method, 5. the sentence method, 6 the story method.

The sentence method or look and say method in other words is often used in situational teaching. It perceives the whole sentence as the minimum meaningful unit. The procedure goes as follows: sentence - > phrase-> words-> letters. Readers find it difficult to read a sentence without the knowledge of words and letters. Thus, it is rather a time consuming method. The story method is the most advanced one. The teacher tells the story in four or five sentences illustrated through pictures. The children first memorize the story and then read it. Before-teaching-practices should not be neglected with this method. Scholars recognize six word recognition strategies, namely, context clues, morphemic analysis, word analysis, ask a friend, skip the word, phonics. Activating or building background

Chapter II. The principles of teaching listening comprehension 2. 1. Reasons for teaching listening comprehension One of the main reasons for getting students to listen to spoken English is to let them hear different varieties and accents - rather then just the voice of their teacher with its own idiosyncrasies. In today’s world, they need to be exposed not only to one variety of English (British English, for example) but also to varieties such as American English, Australian English, Caribbean English, Indian English or West African English. There are, of course, problems associated with the issue of language variety. Within British English, for example, there are many different dialects and accents. The differences are not only in the pronunciation of sounds (‘ bath ’ like ‘ laugh ’ vs.

In order to define listening, we must outline the main component skills in listening. In terms of the necessary components, we can list the following:  discrimination between sounds  recognizing words  identifying grammatical groupings of words  identifying ‘pragmatic units’ - expressions and sets of utterance which function as whole units to create meaning  connecting linguistic cues to paralinguistic cues (intonation and stress) and to nonlinguistic cues (gestures and relevant objects in the situation) in order to construct meaning  using background knowledge (what we already know about the content and the form) and context (what has already been said) to predict and then to confirm meaning  recalling important words and ideas Successful listening involves an integration of these

about meaning . Effective listeners develop a useful way of thinking about meaning as they listen. The way in which listener makes these decisions is what we will call a listening strategy . 2.2. Principles for developing listening ability Using general knowledge about language skill development, we can draw up some guidelines for developing listening ability: (a) Listening ability develops through face-to-face interaction. By interacting in English, learners have the chance for new language input and the chance to check their own listening ability. Face-to-face interaction provides stimulation for development of listening for meaning. (b) Listening develops through focusing on meaning and trying to learn new and important content in the target language. By focusing on meaning and real rea

 different text types (conversational, narrative, informative etc.). The motivation for the learner should be pleasure, interest, and a growing confidence at being able to understand the spoken language without reference to the written form. (b) to train the learners to listen flexibly e. g. for specific information, for the main idea or ideas, or to react to instructions (i. e. by doing something). The motivation for this type of listening will come from tasks, which are interesting in their own right, and which will focus the learners’ attention on the material in an appropriate way. (c) to provide, through listening, a stimulus for other activities e. g. discussion, reading and writing. (d) to give the learners opportunities to interact while listening . In the classroom this must be d

2.3. The structure of listening comprehension and types of activities 1.Organisation of listening comprehension Listening comprehension is divided into four main sections: Section I. Attentive listening Section II. Intensive listening Section III. Selective listening Section IV. Interactive listening Each section helps students develop a range of skills and strategies. Section I: Attentive listening is designed to give students practice with listening and with supplying short responses to the speaker, either verbally or non- verbally through actions. Because this kind of ‘responsive’ listening involves immediate processing of information and quick decisions about how to respond, the activities in Section I provide a great deal of support to help the learners ‘process’ the information they

contrasts of form - grammatical, lexical, or phonological - the teacher can easily adapt the activities to more proficient students by increasing the complexity of the language forms. Section III: Selective listening will help enable students to identify a purpose for listening. By providing focused information-based tasks, the activities in Section III help direct the students’ attention on key words, discourse sequence cues, or ‘information structures’ exchanges in which factual information is given. By learning to attend to words, cues, and facts selectively , students at all levels come to handle short naturalistic text (such as announcements) as well as longer and more complex texts (such as authentic video programmes). Because the task support in these activities can b adjusted, Sect

2.4.. Listening as a stimulus to other activities The activities in this section are specially designed to lead on to activities involving other skills. (a) Jigsaw listening As its name implies, the basic mechanism underlying this activity is that the information needed to complete a task (such as attending a meeting) has been shared out between 3-4 groups in the class. Each group listens to its own piece of recorded material and notes down on a worksheet the information available. The groups then combine to pool their information. (b) Ambiguous conversations The students hear a short conversation (or an extract from a long conversation), which provides very few clues as to what the speakers are talking about. The students themselves have to decide who the speakers are, where they are, wha

listening make notes (and can also ask questions if they want more information). They then use these notes to write a description of the picture . Interactive listening Most interactive listening situations are in the form of discussions and games. Two important points need to be kept in mind. First, these activities form the basis of oral work, where the emphasis is on getting the learners to use language for self-expression. It should not be forgotten, however, that listening is an important aspect of these activities. The learners have to listen in order to participate. Secondly, although these activities are normally done in groups, in order to give the students themselves as many opportunities as possible to use language, we should also look for suitable opportunities to interact with

up visually among the participants, who have to talk and ask questions in order to build up the complete story. Games, which involve the evaluation of a player’s performance, such as, Use it , also provide purposeful listening practice. (d) Interviews The students can be asked to design questionnaires or surveys, which they use to interview one another or people outside the classroom. Interviewing of this kind involves careful listening and recording of answers . Listening material The usage of the authentic listening material is one of the problems in the teaching listening comprehension. The important point, as always, is to meet the needs of the learners. On the short-term basis the learners need to listen to material, which allows them to feel comfortable, perhaps because it is mainly

linked to the oral skills in normal speech situations, it may sometimes be useful to separate the two skills for teaching and testing, since it is possible to develop listening ability much beyond the range of speaking and writing ability if the practice material is not dependent on spoken responses and written exercises. An awareness of the way in which the spoken language differs from the written language is of crucial importance in the testing of the listening skills. For example, the spoken language is much more complex than the written language in certain ways, as a result of the large element of ‘redundancy’ that it contains [4, p.64]. Such features of redundancy make it possible for mutilated messages to be understood. Furthermore, the human brain has a limited capacity for the rece

Conclusion Reading is an activity with a purpose. A person may read in order to gain information or verify existing knowledge, or in order to critique a writer's ideas or writing style. The purpose for reading also determines the appropriate approach to reading comprehension. Reading is an interactive process that goes on between the reader and the text, resulting in comprehension. The reader uses knowledge, skills, and strategies to determine what that meaning is. Reading comprehension is thus much more than decoding. Reading comprehension results when the reader knows which skills and strategies are appropriate for the type of text, and understands how to apply them to accomplish the reading purpose. Therefore, the mastery of listening as the views of speech activity should ensure a

3. Helps to create the questionnaire based on the text about its theme or idea. It often helps in better understanding of the said paragraph. 4. It helps to link the event of narration with our previous experiences and predict the next probable event in the course based on the information given in the narration. Comprehension is the ultimate goal of reading. However, there are a number of factors which may interfere with an individual's ability to comprehend text material. The most common single obstacle to text comprehension is decoding insufficiency. Simply put, if the student cannot decode accurately and automatically, comprehension will be compromised. – When the student cannot «apprehend» or decode the word, meaning cannot be extracted. – When the student cannot decode fluentl

Bibliography 1. Adams, Marilyn Jager. Beginning to Read: Thinking and Learning about Print, MIT Press, 1990, p. 27. 2. Alderson J.C. & Urquhart A.H. (eds.). Reading in a foreign language. London: Longman, 1984. 3. Alderson J.C. Reading in a foreign language: a reading problem or a language problem? // Alderson J.C. & Urquhart A.H. (eds.). Reading in a foreign language. London: Longman, 1984. P. 1–24. 4. Aldridge, M. (1989). Student questioning: A case for freshman academic empowerment. RTDE, 5 (2), 17–24. 5. Anisfeld, M. (1987). A course to develop competence in critical reading of empirical research in psychology. Teaching of Psychology, 14, 224–227. 6. Baker, L. & Brown, A. (1984). Cognitive monitoring in reading. In J. Flood (Ed.), Understanding Reading Comprehension. Newark

Life : A 14. Mustafa Sevik. Teaching Listening Skills to Young Learners through “Listen and Do” Songs. English Teaching Forum, 2012. 15. Ömer Gökhan Ulum. Listening: The Ignored Skill in EFL Context. International Journal of Humanities Social Sciences and Education (IJHSSE), May 2015. 16. Rajni K. Chand. Insights from research on listening skills. Athabasca University – Canada's Open University, 2007. 17. Richard C. The power of storytelling in the classroom. The Minds eyes, 2005. 18. Sherman, J. Using authentic video in the language classroom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003. 19. .Shirley C Raines; Brian Scott Smith . Story stretchers for the primary grades activities to expand children's books, Silver Spring, MD, 2011. 41

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