9.3.4. Specialist skills of reading

9.3.4.1. Predictive skills

Efficient readers predict what they are going to read. The process of understanding the text is the process of seeing how the content of the text matches up to these predictions. In the first instance, their predictions will be the results of the expectations they have. The field of expectations helps predictive skills work better. As they continue to read, their predictions will change as they receive more information from the text. One of the main functions of the lead-in stage when teaching receptive skills will be to encourage predictive skills of the learners.

9.3.4.2. Extracting specific information

Very often we read something because we want to extract specific bit of information – to find out a fact or two (e.g.: We may quickly look through a film review just to find the name of a star). In such a case we may disregard the other information in the review. We may be aware of this information and may even, at some level, take it in. But we do so at speed as we focus in on the specific information we are looking for. The skill when applied to reading is often called scanning reading.

9.3.4.3. Getting the general picture

We often read things because we want to ‘get the general picture’. We want to have an idea of the main points of the text (an overview) without being too concerned with the details. When applied to reading this skill is often called skimming. It entails the reader’s ability to pick out main points rapidly, discarding what is not essential or relevant to the general picture.

9.3.4.4. Extracting detailed information

A reader often has to be able to access texts for detailed information. The information required can be of any kind. The reader may have to answer the questions like: ‘Exactly what does the writer mean?’ Questions like ‘How? How many? Why? Who? What for?’ are often answered by reference to this kind of detail. Sometimes the detail we are looking for is the writer’s attitude: ‘How does he feel about the situation/the persons he is describing? What precisely is the writer’s intention?’ In our need to teach purposeful reading with an emphasis on skimming and scanning, we should not forget the importance of detailed reading (general and close reading varying in the degree of exactness of the extracted information).

9.3.4.5. Recognising function and discourse patterns

Native speakers of English know that when they read ‘for example’, this phrase is likely to be followed by an example. When they read ‘in other words’, a concept is about to be explained in a different way. Recognising such discourse markers is an important part of understanding how a text is constructed. We understand paragraph structure and paragraph organisation and we recognise devices for cohesion. We need to make students aware of these features in order to help them to become more efficient readers.

9.3.4.6. Deducing meaning from context

Meaning in context. One of the things to realise about vocabulary items is that they frequently have more than one meaning. When we come across a word and try to decipher its meaning, we will have to look at the context in which it is used. The importance of meaning in context is clearly shown in the following sentences: (i) ‘But I booked my tickets three weeks ago!’ – If we read about a woman in the theatre arguing at the ticket office we will obviously understand the meaning of the verb ‘to book’. This meaning is different when a policeman, accompanied by an unhappy-looking man at the police station says to his colleague: (ii) ‘We’ve booked him for speeding’.

Sense relations. Sometimes words have meanings in relation to other words. We understand the meaning of a word like ‘good’ in the context of a word like ‘bad’. Words have opposites (=antonyms) and they also have other words with similar meanings (=synonyms), e.g. ‘bad’ and ‘evil’. Even in that example, one thing is clear: words seldom have absolute synonyms, although context may make them synonymous on particular occasions. As far as meaning goes, good readers need to know about meaning in context and they need to know about sense relations to be able to deduce the meanings of unfamiliar words from the context in which they appear.

All the skills mentioned here are largely subconscious in the minds of experienced and fluent readers – most literate adults. But reading in a foreign language creates barriers for the learner, which may make these skills and sub-skills more difficult to use. This comes often through fear of failure or through simple frustration. Our job is to re-activate these skills, which learners have in their own language, but which may be less effective when they are faced with English. If we can make students feel less anxious and thus remove some of the barriers, that alone may dramatically improve their receptive abilities.