14. Teaching reading comprehension. Types of reading. Teaching the techniques of reading. Ways of teaching reading. Requirements to texts for tr. Control of reading comprehension.

Reading is a complex cognitive process of decoding symbols for the intention of deriving meaning (reading comprehension) and/or constructing meaning. Reading is a means of communication, and of sharing information and ideas. According to Webster's Dictionary, comprehension is "the capacity for understanding fully; the act or action of grasping with the intellect." Webster also tells us that reading is "to receive or take in the sense of (as letters or symbols) by scanning; to understand the meaning of written or printed matter; to learn from what one has seen or found in writing or printing. There are different types of reading skills. Skimming - reading rapidly for the main points Scanning - reading rapidly to find a specific piece of information Extensive - reading a longer text, often for pleasure with emphasis on overall meaning Intensive reading - reading a short text for detailed information. Exercises aimed to teach receptive skills required for detailed reading comprehension can be divided into several groups depending on the purpose you want to achieve. I. The first group of exercises is to familiarize the students with the topic, develop guessing skills, create expectations and interest in the text they are going to read. These are pre-reading exercises. Note: the students should see all the tasks before reading the text. Can you guess what the text is about judging by the title? What do you think the following names, figures or dates (if there are any) have to do with the story? Note: the teacher can arrange what the students say in a column on the blackboard and then give the task to look through the text quickly to prove if their guesses were false or true. What do you know or what have you heard about the subject you are going to read about? Note: here the teacher can write the things the students say on the blackboard and then offer them to read the text quickly and see if their statements were true or false or the teacher can write the things the students say in the form of a chart: and then offer the students to read the text as quickly as possible and again confirm (or not) the information on the chart. II. The next group of exercises aims to teach the students to extract specific information. The students should scan the text to extract the information which the tasks demand. They do not have to pay attention to the parts of the text they do not understand. Previewing for the topic. Ask the students to read the topic (if there is one), the first sentence of each paragraph and the last sentence of the passage and guess what the text is about, or what the general idea is. The teacher offers some statements and the students are to find out if they are false of true. The students may be given some questions to answer. Note: the students may be divided into groups, each group given the same number of questions to make the work more competitive. III. Detailed comprehension check. At this stage the exercises involve the study of vocabulary, the identification of grammar constructions, word order, detailed analysis of the text. 1. Phrasing - you should let your eyes move over a phrase not a word before making logical stops while reading. 2. Restating means looking for grammatical structures that express the same meaning: passive - active, direct - indirect speech, wish -phrases, etc. 3. Join two sentences with the help of given conjunctions.4. Match exercises (synonymous expressions). 5. Complete the following definition of a phrase. 6. Fill in the gap. Put in either a noun or an adjective, a verb or an adverb. 7. Choose an answer which gives the meaning of each phrase. 8. Find the words or expressions that are used in the text to give the following meaning. 9. Arrange jumbled sentences or texts. 10. Make inferences or logical conclusions on the basis of evidence given in the text. IV. These exercises are more concerned with summing up the content of the text, investigation into the writer's opinion and may entail some kind of follow-up-task related to the text. - Find the most important sentence in each paragraph. - Match each sentence of the jumbled summary with the correct paragraph. - Use your imagination and write your end of the story, express your attitude to the story, etc. - What is your attitude to the story? Write a letter to the editor. - Organise a press conference.