ELT World Discussion

Sherri · Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 10:21 pm Post subject: Reading outloud

I have always hated having students read outloud in class (I teach adults by the way). I could never see the point of it especially in a "reading" class. Why do I hate it? Mainly because the student reading spends so much time thinking about how to say the words that they don't have any space in their brain to understand what they are reading, also I find that it bores the other students (and me) if it goes on too long. The students I work with are preparing for college level classes. I don't imagine reading outloud is a commonly requested skill. Most of the time students are required to read on their own time, silently.

However, while attending my daughter's 2nd grade orientation, the teacher told the parents that repeated reading outloud enhances fluency and comprehension. So she gives out short (1 page) passages for students to practice reading outloud repeatedly (as homework). The vocab is graded according to frequency.

So I started thinking about this for adult ESL learners. I know there is a different process going on between the 2 groups of learners and of course they have different needs. I believe Richard Day has done some research in this area but I have to admit not paying much attention to it.

How about you? Do you have your students read outloud? If so why and how it is working out for you? Do you do repeated readings? How is that working? I am mainly interested in reading for comprehension and response--not for pronunciation or listening.

Thanks for reading this--silently I am guessing...
Sherri

Jerry · Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 11:25 pm Post subject:

Let them choose their own reading material. Make up a grid: day, time, and piece read. Tell them to time themselves over exactly one minute and mark how much they have covered while reading aloud ( without stopping to understand or trying to pronounce exactly )
At the time of their choice ( next day, next week, half an hour later ) do the same again and track how much they've covered.
Do this with the same piece as often as they want.
This is something they can do at home or on their own and doesn't take up class time.
They don't have to pick up speed to cover more, their improved fluency and confidence takes over.
With genuine learners I've found the results stunning.

Sherri · Posted: Fri Aug 01, 2008 1:47 am Post subject:

Hi Jerry
Thanks for your response. Stunning results sound great! How do you measure the results? Can you see changes in their reading comprehension in general? How else do you measure their results? Do they like doing it?
Sorry about so many questions.
Sherri

denise · Posted: Fri Aug 01, 2008 5:10 am Post subject:

sadly-confused · Cadet Joined: 10 Jan 2008 Posts: 44

Dont know if it helps, but about 10 years ago the psych dept at my local uni was researching this subject. they had a working hypothysis that the standard speed reading methods did little for comprehension and next to nothing for retention, however reading aloud improved both. The reasoning behind this was that reading aloud was slower than the brains ability to think about and store useful info.

I have been trying it myself whilst studying and found that there is more than a grain of truth behind it, although you do look a proper dork sitting on public transpost reading Chomsky aloud.
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Jerry · Posted: Fri Aug 01, 2008 1:02 pm Post subject:

I'm going to sit down and try to expand on my "stunning" claim. It'll take a bit of time and I don't want to sound like I have all the answers so I'll diarise each step. Please excuse me if it takes a day or two but it's the only way I can explain what happened.
I must say that it was a Japanese couple who first showed any results.
I don't think I'm a great teacher, I think I accidentally stumbled on this.

tarte tatin · Captain Joined: 07 Sep 2007 Posts: 101 Location: Istanbul

I have used reading aloud in class sometimes, some Tefly colleagues have been a bit sniffy about it - apparently some consider it a big no no.

I don't do it alot but my reasons are:

If students, see, hear and say a text this addresses different learner types.

I can hear if there are words they really have no idea how to pronounce.

Classroom management -I call on students to take over so they have to stay alert, plus everyone finishes the text at the same time and speed.

I never have any one student reading the whole text and of course I don't do this with stumbling beginners. I have also found in my own experience of learning foreign languages that reading aloud increased my confidence, allowing me to 'get my tongue around' the language without thinking about supplying the language at the same time.

TheLongWayHome · Posted: Sat Aug 02, 2008 2:28 am Post subject:

I find it physically painful to hear students mangling the English language by reading aloud. I don't believe it does anything for their pronunciation unless you're going to correct every single sound.

The only thing I've found that improves reading (aloud) skills is to first teach them phonetics, get them to a point where they can read phonetic script and understand from a sound point of view what they are reading. I then take them back to a normal text and their reading aloud is so much better. They finally begin link sounds with letter combinations. Reading (aloud) without some awareness of this is just overlaying their L1 sound combinations onto English. Or maybe it was a fluke... Shocked

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Glenski · Captain Joined: 28 Sep 2007 Posts: 428

Reading aloud individually in a classroom is wrong, IMO. It embarrassed students, and in Japan, you know how hard that can be on people.

Read aloud in groups. Individual voices are muted, and confidence soars. It can be very good practice.

Read aloud AFTER you read something. I don't like shadowing (immediate and same pace as the teacher), but if you demonstrate the pronunciation and give them time to hear it, as well as the chunks of words you can utter, it will help them.

It helps pronunciation and builds confidence and shows students how to read faster by showing them how to read in chunks (when they read silently).

Guy Courchesne · Posted: Sat Aug 02, 2008 3:56 pm Post subject:

I agree with Glenski on this.

Reading aloud does nothing for pronunciation and if used at all, it should follow a comprehension activity or silent reading.

If you insist on bridging reading to pronunciation/intonation, then I suggest backchaining the exercise.

http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/category/glossary/backchaining
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dreadnought · Posted: Sat Aug 02, 2008 8:12 pm Post subject:

Agree with Glenski and Guy on this.

I wouldn't say it's an absolute no-no, but it's important to ask yourself what the purpose of doing it is.

Is it helping the students understand the text any better? Probably not. The students are focussing so much on getting the pronunciation right that any comprehension is going straight out the window.

Is it helping them with pronunciation? This is often the justification for doing it, but I genuinely wonder if it does. I know my students can pronounce many words perfectly, but will often mispronounce them when they read them in a text. This is because their brains have to process so much (grammar, punctuation, chunking, meaning) and it's only natural they make mistakes.

I think there is a difference between pronouncing a word correctly and being able to read a word or text aloud correctly. Reading aloud is a very specific skill and is only really needed in real life if you frequently give speeches/presentations in front of people. Most people reading aloud in their native language will have difficulties and stumble over their words because it is not a common or natural skill.

So, if you are preparing your students to be politicians or motivational speakers, then maybe it's worth teaching them to read aloud. Otherwise, it only really serves to make students feel uncomfortable or demotivated and doesn't really develop either their reading or pronunciation skills.

On the other hand it does kill absolutely loads of time in class...and this, I suspect, is why it is such a popular activity Wink

Sherri · Posted: Sat Aug 02, 2008 9:02 pm Post subject:

Thanks for all of your responses! I have observed literally hundreds of classes and most of the time when I see a teacher having students read outloud it is because they don't actually know how to teach reading skills. Then usually they go through the passage line by line explaining what each means while the students sit in silence. In the end the only utterance I hear from students is when they read outloud.

Anyway, I what I am really considering here is what the 2nd grade teacher said about the correlation between fluency reading outloud (after repeated practice at home) and comprehension in reading overall. I think I may just have to ask for her sources so that I can understand it better. It appears to be a nation-wide curriculum standard.

Maybe this is not relevant to adult learners? I am considering trying graded passages (just below their vocab level) to read aloud as homework, and just show the teacher their timed results and the marked up page.

Sherri