This article draws on a study that investigated an implementation of reading-to-learn pedagogy (R2L) on EFL students' writing. The study involved a group of Year 8 students from an Indonesian public school who were taught English using R2L strategies that had been specifically developed for EFL classrooms, where both L1 and L2 are used as the…

The benefits of extensive reading (ER) are well known, yet integrating ER into curricula has been problematic. One factor is the adherence to the principle that students should freely choose what to read, which complicates connecting out-of-class reading with in-class content. Class readers, however, can more easily tie in book content with…

Lessons designed to teach reading and listening typically concentrate on the use of higher-level skills and strategies, such as predicting, scanning, inferencing, understanding text structure, or activating background knowledge. Given that these normal communication skills are already available to students for mother-tongue use, they should…

Most learners experience the teaching of reading in the classroom in the form of intensive reading activities, where learners are provided with support, typically by the teacher, to make sense of texts that are too difficult for the learners to read successfully by themselves. After reading, learners are usually expected to answer a series of…

Recent research in reading comprehension in Western settings has focused on collecting evidence from reading tests that would measure relevant ESL reading constructs to inform reading instruction and assessment. Similar studies in non-Western contexts, however, remain under-reported. This study involved 958 senior secondary Hong Kong (Chinese)…

This article looks at Year 9 (age 13) ESL learners in a secondary school in Hong Kong producing--with minimal input and support from their teachers--their own story books, these being the final task outcome in a series of lessons focusing on creativity. Over a period of two months, as an integral part of their ESL lessons, groups of students…

Discusses specific features of expository writing that are indicative of an author's objectivity and then describes exercises for making advanced second language students aware of these devices and improving their critical faculties. (EKN)

Reports on a procedure devised to train students in efficient reading comprehension strategies by using a standard exercise which can be applied to any reading text. Explains the purpose of each question and students' reactions to it. Comments on text selection and suggests that much of the technique could apply to listening comprehension. (EKN)

Describes a standard approach in lessons about English literature that concentrate on the pupil's analytical faculties. A description is provided of a new learner-oriented activity that requires no direct interference by the teacher, and a lesson transcript is included. (GLR)

Lists ten prinicples for teaching reading in English as a second language. Some of these principles are: (1) an interesting text is vital; (2) the primary activity of a reading lesson should be learners' reading texts; (3) classroom procedure should reflect the purposeful task-based, interactive nature of reading. (SED)

Discusses the findings of a general survey of primary schools in Nigeria to discover the practices of teachers teaching English reading. Findings indicate that the reading-while-listening method of teaching reading is not as effective as the combination of the alphabetic, phonic, word, and sentence methods. (SED)

Discusses whether the methods of linguistic analysis can help students of English as a second language (ESL) as they struggle with a complex piece of creative writing. Argues that stylistic analysis, instead of aiding an ESL student's reading, actually impedes it because it is alien to the spirit in which persons read. (SED)

Introduces the activity of student-written reading logs as a practical application of reader-response theory in English-as-Foreign-Language literature teaching. Because reader-response theory stresses the synthesis between reader and text, it is proposed that practical applications should be based on the interaction. (Author/VWL)

Focus in recent times on realistic pedagogy implies that we can no longer depend on a transmission model of training, either for teachers or learners. We need to develop strategies that will help teachers and learners to be co-participators in the learning process. Mental modelling is one technique suggested in this article. It is a technique…

Discusses the value of using poetry to teach English as a second language to mixed ability classes. Lists the following criteria for selecting poems: (1) universal appeal; (2) surface simplicity, (3) potential depth, (4) affective potential, (5) contemporary language, (6) brevity, and (7) potential for illustration. Describes ways of using two…