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'Top ten pr inc iples forteaching readingRay Williams

In order for the teaching of EFL reading to be effective, it is important forteachers regularly to take stock of their perception of the nature of thereading process itself, relevant reading activities, and appropriate class-room management. This article puts forward the authors views on whichare the importantprinciples in teaching EFL reading, and invites teachers toconsider them as a starting point for a re-evaluation of their ownphilosophy.As an introductory ice-breaker on reading seminars which I conduct withEFL teachers, we usually start with an exchange of views on fundamentalprinciples. A handout lists my principles, which I ask teachers to evaluateand add to. Some of the principles we discuss are amazingly self-evi-dent - no bad thing, since in EFL, in our constant search for the novel, weoften overlook the obvious. Other principles sometimes provoke contro-versy - which is also welcome, since the objective of the seminar is not toproduce stereotypical attitudes to teaching reading in EFL but to encour-age teachers to re-examine their existing beliefs about the nature of thereading process, text choice, text-based activities, and classroom manage-ment procedures.

The following are my top ten principles:1 In the absence of interesting texts, very little is possible. An obvious principle,but one which is often forgotten. Interest is vital, for it increases motivation,which in turn is a significant factor in the development of reading speed andfluency. Interesting to whom? First and foremost to the learner, but prefer-ably interesting also to the teacher. How do we know what our learners areinterested in reading in English? Ask them what they like reading in theirown language, peer over their shoulders in the library, ask the schoollibrarian, spend a few minutes in the local bookshop; then find texts inEnglish, of an appropriate level, on similar topics. To check the interest-level of texts currently being used in your EFL reading course, ask learnersto assess them as interesting, all right, or boring. But be prepared for afew surprises!2 The primary activity of a reading lesson should be learners reading texts - notlistening to the teacher, not reading comprehension questions, not writinganswers to comprehension questions, not discussing the content of the text.This is not to say that such activities are unimportant; but it is a question ofbalance. Of course, if the objective of a particular lesson is the integration ofthe reading activity with another skill (e.g. an associated writing task), thenthe lesson will justifiably have two equally important activities. But myemphasis on the primacy of learners reading in a single-skill reading onlylesson is to stress that the central activity of learners reading must not beELT Journal Volume 40/1 January 1986 Oxford University Press 1986

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allowed to become submerged in a welter of peripheral supportive activi-ties. Learners learn to read by reading: there is no other way.3 Growth in language ability is an essential part of the development of reading ability.The pendulum in recent years has swung towards an emphasis on teachingappropriate skills and strategies. This re-orientation is welcome; but wemust not forget that the best skills and strategies in the world will have littleeffect unless learners are simultaneously expanding their sight vocabul-ary, and their recognition knowledge of commonly occurring sentencepatterns and rhetorical patternings in text. In fact, Alderson (1984:l-27),having reviewed the relevant literature, suggests that a minimum languagethreshold is necessary before reading skills and strategies (including theirtransfer from the mother tongue) can successfully operate.4 Classroom procedure should reflect the purposeful, task-based, interactive nature ofreal reading. A psycholinguistic model of the reading process (e.g. Goodman1967) holds that the reader is actively engaged in striving to reconstruct theauthors message. He or she participates in an internal dialogue in whichhypotheses are formed, predictions made, doubts expressed, uncertaintiessubsequently clarified, new information grafted on to old, old views modi-fied by new, etc. Reading is thus not only active but interactive - ust asinteractive as audible conversation. How can the interactivity which is anintrinsic part of efficient, real reading be fostered in the reading classroom?Through classroom procedures involving pairwork and groupwork inwhich inter-learner discussion of the text and associated tasks is not onlypermitted but required. Purposeful, audible interactivity of this nature (notnecessarily in English) replicates the interactivity which is characteristic ofthe efficient, individual, silent reader.

In particular, this essential interactivity should encourage learners tomake use of what they have read. This can be done by requiring thecompletion of a diagrammatic representation of (part of) the text-matrix,flowchart, tree-diagram, etc. For example, in relation to a description of asatellite launching vehicle (SLV-3) in a text for Indian students entitledIndia Zooms into Space, the following grid has been a useful stimulus.Complete the following specification of SLV-3

Constructed Diameter of Propellant Thrust Destructionof system (yes/(material) motor Type Amount no)Fourth stageThird stage ,.. ..,Second stageFirst stageTotal length:... Total weight:

Encouraging learners to make use of what they have read can also beachieved by means of suitably phrased application questions. Forexample (in relation to the same text):

*What advantages do you think Indias space programme will bring tothe average person living in India today?

(Both exercises are taken from Williams, Ray and Swales 1984:46-7.)Top ten principles for teaching reading 43

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5 Teachers must learn to be quiet: all too often, teachers interfere with and so impedetheir learners reading development by being too dominant and by talking too much.Although it can and should be fostered by collaborative groupwork, in thefinal analysis reading is an individual skill, like swimming or playing thepiano. It has to be practised under guidance, with copious encouragement,and with carefully set goals. The teachers role is therefore less that ofinformation-giver/text-explainer, and more that of coach/classroom organ-izer/trouble-shooter/consultant/personnel manager/catalyst. This latterrole is a far more professional one (and far more demanding!) than that ofstraightforward text-explainer/question-asker.

Many teachers find it difficult to abandon their customary centre-stagerole, and to become a learning-manager rather than a teacher. But there isenormous satisfaction to be gained from assisting groups of learners withtheir own particular difficulties, seeing them progress at their optimumrate, and observing the pleasure that learners derive from understandingand enjoying a text when more of the responsibility for learning is placed ontheir shoulders - where it properly belongs.6 Exercise-types should, as far as possible, approximate to cognitive reality. Sincethe purpose of teaching reading is to make the learner a more efficientreader, it follows that we need to identify the strategies, skills, and objec-tives of the efficient reader during the process of real reading (as opposed tothe classroom teaching of reading), and then help the learner to acquirethem. In other words we need to identify just what the efficient reader does(by examining our own cognitive processes, perhaps).

Investigations of the reading process (self-report, self-observation, andthink-aloud), focusing on individual case-studies, are throwing very inter-esting light on what readers do during the process of reading (see e.g. vanParreren and Schouten-van Parreren 1981; Cohen 1984; Hosenfeld 1984).We must now apply the fruits of this growing body of knowledge to thecreation of more appropriate exercise-types.7 A learner will not become a proficient reader simply by attending a reading course orworking through a reading textbook. For every hour of intensive reading, alearner should be doing at least another hour of extensive reading - bymeans of a graded reader system, a collection of carefully-chosen texts,simple paperbacks, etc. It does not matter very much what learners read inextensive reading, as long as they enjoy doing it. A system of graded readersis, of course, one of the most effective ways of promoting extensive reading.Nuttall (1982: 174-82) gives excellent advice concerning setting up andadministering such a scheme.8 A reader contributes meaning to a text. Reading is not simply a matter oftaking out (information, opinion, enjoyment, etc.), like shopping at asupermarket; it also involves contributing (attitudes, experience, priorknowledge, etc.). This natural characteristic of real reading must beencouraged and developed in teaching EFL reading. This can be done byincluding questions or tasks which require readers to combine what is intheir heads with what is in the text. (Such questions and tasks can beindicated by a symbol, such as * if necessary.)

9 Progress in reading requires learners to use their ears, as well as their eyes. As withaudible reading, silent reading involves stress and intonation or prosody.Research (e.g. Pegolo 1985) suggests that the more accurate the readersRay Williams

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internal prosody, the greater the degree of comprehension. Therefore,learners should be encouraged also to listen to texts - such as tapes accom-panying graded readers, specially recorded tapes, the teacher reading tothe class, older learners reading to younger learners, and better readersreading to weaker readers in their group.10 Using a text does not necessarily equal teaching reading. Texts can be used formany different purposes. For example. it is perfectly sensible to use a text todemonstrate a certain grammatical or functional point in context, as atrigger for further work on that point.. But it would be a mistake to thinkthat one was thereby teaching reading. Johns and Davies (1983) make theimportant distinction between what they call TALO (text as linguisticobject) and TAVI (text as vehicle for information). In TALO, the text is acarrier for the teaching of language - grammar, vocabulary, etc. - which islaboriously mined from the text by the teacher and learners (usually withthe teacher as chief miner). This a perfectly justifiable use of text as one wayof teaching language: but it contributes very little to the development oflearners reading skills.

In contrast, using a text for the purposes of developing reading skills(what Johns and Davies call the TAVI approach) uses a suitably chosentext for the development of appropriate cognitive strategies which lead tothe learner reconstructing the authors original message (which is verydifferent from understanding the elements of language which the authoruses to carry that message). Such a use of text has as its objective thedevelopment of generalizable, transferable strategies of meaning-reconstruc-tion, which the learner can eventually employ outside the reading lessonwithout the assistance of the teacher or a course in reading. When ourlearners reach the stage when they no longer need our help, that is success:as teachers of reading our professional objective is to make ourselvesredundant! Received January 1983

ReferencesAlderson, J. C. 1984. Reading in a foreign language:a reading problem or a language problem? in J. C.Alderson and A. H. Urquhart (eds.). Reading in aForeign Language. London: Longman.Cohen, A. 1984. Studying second-language learningstrategies: how do we get the information? AppliedLinguistics 5/2:101-12.Goodman, K. S. 1967. Reading: a psycholinguisticguessing game. Journal of the Reading Specialist 4: 126-35.Hosenfeld, C. 1984. Case studies of ninth grade read-ers in J. C. Alderson and A. H. Urquhart (eds.).Reading in a Foreign Language. London: Longman.Johns, T. and F. Davies. 1983. Text as a vehicle forinformation: the classroom use of written texts inteaching reading in a foreign language. Reading in aForeign Language l/1:1-19.Nuttall, C. 1982. Teaching Reading Skills in a ForeignLanguage. London: Heinemann.

Parreren, C. F. van and M. C. Schouten-van Par-reren. 1981. Contextual guessing: a trainablereader strategy. System 9/3:235-41.Pegolo, C. 1983. More efficient silent reading com-prehension. Reading in a Foreign Language 3/1.Williams, R. C., R. Ray, and J. M. Swales. 1984.Communication in English for Technical Students.Hyderabad: Orient Longman.

The authorRay Williams has taught EFL and ESP since 1965 - nZambia, Malalwi, Hong Kong, and at Aston Univer-sity in England. At the College of St Mark and St John,Plymouth, he is currently course leader for theDiploma in Education (ELT) and Certificate in Teach-ing Reading in EFL. His publications include Pan-orama: An Advanced Course of English for Study andExaminations (Longman 1982) and Readable Writing(Longman 1985). He is co-editor (with AlexanderUrquhart) of the journal Reading in a Foreign Language.

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