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THE WRITTEN FOREIGN LANGUAGE.
APPROXIMATION, MATURATION AND IMPROVEMENT
OF THE READER-WRITER PROCESS.
THE READING COMPREHENSION: TECHNIQUES FOR
GLOBAL AND SPECIFIC COMPREHENSION OF TEXTS.
THE WRITTEN EXPRESSION: FROM THE
INTERPRETATION TO THE PRODUCTION OF TEXTS.
INTRODUCTION.
In the first part of the unit, I am going to explain the relationship that exists
between the reading and writing skills. Both terms are narrowing linked
because these skills are present from the first stages in the approach of the
foreign language. The language is firstly heard and then it is read.
Reading, is an important skill, which can contribute to the accomplishment
of a language in posterior stages. This skill can be useful in order to
achieve vocabulary, or it can be a motive to read for pleasure. The
additional lecture, which is read in a voluntary way, offers the opportunity
to learn in an unconscious way aspects like culture from the foreign
language. The main advantage of the reading for the students is that it
improves their general English level. We have as teachers to encourage the
complementary readings, which has to be chose by the students.
We have to realise that, when we are going to teach a language in the first
stages, our students do not have knowledge about grammar or syntax. Due
to that, the teacher will be the guide in the learning. Teachers will have to
use some strategies like the comment of the illustrations, the chose of easy
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situations In the first stages, it would be advisable direct to our students
with patters, which has the same structure.
a) Type one skills, are those operations that students perform on a text
when they tackle (enfrentar) it for the first time. The first thing the students are
asked to do with a text concerns it treatment as a whole.
Thus, students may be asked to look at a text and extract specific
information. They might read or listen to perform a task to confirm or
check expectations they have about a text. Type 1 skills are:
- Predictive skills: efficient readers or listeners predict what they
are going to read and hear.
- Extracting specific information: students have to focus on the
specific information they are searching for. This skill, when is
applied to reading is called scanning.
- Getting the general idea: we often read or listen to things
because we want to get the general idea. When applied to
reading this skill is often called skimming.
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b) Type 2 skills are those that are subsequently used when studying
reading or listening material and they involved detailed comprehension
of the text.
They are practised after type 1 skills have been worked on. They are:
- Extracting detailed information like: what does the writer
mean? What precisely is the speaker trying to say? How
many?
- Recognising functions and discourse pattern. To recognise
some discourse markers are an important part of understanding
how a text is constructed. We need to make students aware of
these features in order to help them to become more efficient.
- Deducing meaning from context.
It is convenient that in class, the student gets used to extensive and
intensive reading.
For the intensive readings, the students will work with short texts, from
which they understand basically all the words.
In the extensive reading, students make the effort to understand the
message using all kind the strategies. These are some ideas of reading
activities:
WRITTEN EXPRESSION.
In the last part of the unit, I am going to explain the written expression.
Frequently, writing is relegated to the status of homework. This is a pity
since writing, especially communicative writing, can play a valuable part in
the class.
Reading has a notable influence in the writing expression, the more we
read the better we write. It can be said that, there is a better level in the
written expression in those students who use a more variety of written texts
in their daily life.
When we are going to planning the written activities, we have to consider
the following aspects:
a) Contextualization: when we write a message in real life, we always do it
within a context or situation, because who writes presupposes certain
aspects determined by the situation. We have to be in mind aspects like
the type of the register.
b) Aim: writing has always a purpose, according to this, there will be
determined the expressions, vocabulary, etc. The purpose has to have a
meaning for the student. Due to that, the students need to know different
kind of writings and practise them in order to connect with the possible
reader.
c) Creativity: it seems convenient to provide the student with occasions
where they can create their own texts and feel that it is the product of
their will and personal effort.
d) Motivation: the essential objective in language production is to provide
the student with motivation to learn. If the activities are motivating, the
students will feel an inner satisfaction to learn, to communicate with
others and carry a task they like.
e) Integration: in a communicative approach of writing, it is necessary the
integration with other skills which contributes to several purposes:
- allows the practise of the some linguistic or functional contexts in the
same skills,
- develop two or more linguistic skills within the same context and
- approximates the use of the language to the real world.
A receptive or an oral activity can precede the writing activity.
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