Hi, All:

 

Reading aloud.  Oh, what a blast from the past.  But as several of you have
pointed out, a not so distant past.  

 

It’s true that the process of reading aloud isn’t an end in itself in terms
of supporting reading development.  As Jane pointed out--with some great
quotes from a very useful publication from CAELA--it has limited value.
Doing it well doesn’t necessarily tell you a lot about the reader’s ability
to read (a process that includes comprehension as well as sounding out
words) and it can be impacted by interference from other factors and skills
proficiencies.  Individual reading aloud can also do the very thing that we
don’t want to do with literacy level learners: put them in a situation where
they fear taking a risk or making a mistake, because everyone is listening.
It is just the kind of klieg-light activity that can raise that affective
filter so high that the student has no hope of getting any use out of the
activity and may even begin to dread reading at all. 

 

That said, I can’t throw the baby out with the bath water.  I’ve used choral
reading aloud, as suggested in the CAELA article, to give students a chance
to get the rhythms of words and sentences, the phrasing and flow, and to
engage them in something that points them toward the fluency of the good
reader.  Some will argue that is purely pronunciation, but it is also
reading.  Ted talks about the reading that goes on in the heads of
proficient readers.  Some of these readers might even say that when they are
reading a test, they actually “hear” a voice reading the words.  Choral
reading aloud gives them a model, and one in which they are relatively safe,
of what that the “reading in their heads” should sound like.  I’ve also
found reading aloud to students to be useful.  In doing it, I can provide
models of fluency, but at other times, I can also embed “think alouds” in
it, demonstrating to students how I sound out words that are new or
unfamiliar, providing a model of how a reader works with a text.

 

Finally, I wanted to mention that Ted’s comments reminded me of a really
important point—teachers need to always keep in mind why we are doing what
we are doing.  Doing reading aloud is not bad itself.  Doing it for the
wrong reasons is a waste of time and energy, and we all (students and
teachers) have precious little of both.  Teachers need to always be mindful
and clear—with themselves and with students—as to the purposes of any
activity or task.  Be sure that what you are doing or asking students to do
really does meet the objective that you have in mind.  If it does, and if
you can clearly communicate that to yourself and your students, it’s never a
waste of time and effort.

 

MaryAnn

 

 

MaryAnn Florez

Project Director

Adult Education Professional Development Center

D.C. LEARNs

1612 K Street, N.W. Suite 300

Washington, DC 20006

202/331-0141, x25 (tel)

202/331-0143 (fax)

www.dclearns.org/aepdc 

mflorez at dclearns.org  

 

 

****************************************************************************
**************************

The Adult Education Professional Development Center at DC LEARNs –
Connecting D.C. adult educators with professional development opportunities
and resources.

www.dclearns.org/aepdc

****************************************************************************
********************

The D.C. LEARNs Mission

To work with Washington, D.C. literacy programs, learners, and supporters to
strengthen adult, family and children's literacy services, and present a
strong, unified voice on the importane of literacy as an investment in the
community.

 

D.C. LEARNs' literacy calendar lists significant literacy events or
deadlines, as well as a selected number of regional and national events that
may be of interest to the D.C. literacy community.  If you know of any
upcoming events in the D.C. region, please submit them to be added to our
calendar at info at dclearns.org 

 

You can visit our calendar at http://dclearns.org/calendar2/plans.cgi 

 

If you want to volunteer as a teacher or tutor for GED, ESL, ABE (Adult
Basic Education), Computers, or Children's Literacy, please enter your
information into our volunteer database at www.readoutloud.org 

  _____  

From: Ted Klein [mailto:taklein at austin.rr.com] 
Sent: Thursday, December 13, 2007 12:19 PM
To: The Adult English Language Learners Discussion List
Subject: [EnglishLanguage 1991] Re: Students as Sources;Vocabulary
Development in ESL

 

Mikal,

 

Thank you for the good words. I want to mention something else, that may
stir some people up! It has been years since I had my ESL students read out
loud. Many teachers do this on a daily basis. Here is my logic. Probably the
only students who need to read out loud are those who are going to be radio
announcers or preachers! I always look at function first. I've been making
bets for years with other ESL teachers that they can't give me a GOOD reason
to have their students read out loud. So far nobody has collected. To me,
reading, unlike ballroom dancing or wrestling, is done alone. The goal is to
absorb information, be entertained or be enlightened. Sometimes it appears
that teachers are having their students read out loud to cut down on their
own active time. Some have said, "I do it to check their pronunciation." I
have two good ways to do the same, more effectively: 1. Listen to them
carefully in conversation.  2. Give them a short repeat/imitate test that
contains all of the English sounds at the beginning, middle and the end of
words. Score and annotate specific problems.

 

My students read to themselves and answer written questions about the
contents. They gradually read better.

 

Let me give you a little experiment that can be repeated over and over to
prove my point. Make a couple of flashcards and put the Spanish words:   UN
VASO and DEDO on them. Because of certain phonological "rules" in Spanish,
what you see is not what you get. Just remember than for the most part,
Spanish is much closer phonologically to its written language than is
English.   Walk up to ten U.S. Americans who don't know any Spanish, SHOW
THEM THE CARD and say [umbaso] which is exactly how it is pronounced in
Spanish, due to assimilation. Eight out of the ten will stare at the words
and say "UN+VASO" with the labiodental English "V," which doesn't exist in
Spanish.  Walk up to ten other Americans and ask them to repeat "umbaso"
with no visual reference. Most will have no difficulty repeating that. Next,
do the same thing with the "DEDO" card and say "day though," (with shorter
syllables), which is how it is pronounced in Spanish, due to the fact that
/b/ /d/ and /g/ change to the closest fricative consonants between vowel
sounds. Again there will be a problem while they are looking at the word and
the majority will say "day+dough." Without the cards, they will not have a
problem saying it correctly. 

 

The point is that adults depend way too much on their eyes, to the detriment
of their ears. Reading and pronunciation should remain separate activities.
The closest written language that I know about, that is more phonetic than
most, is Turkish. I can read Turkish rather well out loud and have no vague
idea what I'm saying. Reading out loud and comprehension are separate
skills. 

 

 

T as in listen.

E as in hope.

D as in switched.

 

K as in knock.

L as in talk.

E as in snake.

I as in eye.

N as in gnu.

 

You may call me Ø

 

www.tedklein-ESL.com  

 

 

 

----- Original Message ----- 

From: Steinbacher, <mailto:msteinbacher at cascadia.edu>  Mikal 

To: The <mailto:englishlanguage at nifl.gov>  Adult English Language Learners
Discussion List 

Sent: Thursday, December 13, 2007 9:55 AM

Subject: [EnglishLanguage 1989] Re: Students as Sources; Vocabulary
Development in ESL

 

What a great idea!  I have students read aloud to practice pronunciation and
to get a group identification of new words, but this is certainly a less
"threatening" way of doing it.  

 

I have found that many students "know" a word when they hear it spoken, but
don't reconginize it in writing.  I have developed a "How Do I Spell It?"
handout from several pronunciation keys as a tool for using the dictionary
and sounding words out.  It is a great "ah ha" for both ESL and native
English speakers becasuse it clearly shows the at least one of the reasons
English is such a confusing language to learn!  The number of ways "ai" "ea"
and "ou" are pronounced is enough to give one a headache, let alone the
number of ways the /sh/ sound is spelled!  

 

Thanks for your idea!

 

Mikal Steinbacher

Associate Faculty ESL

Cascadia Community College


  _____  


From: englishlanguage-bounces at nifl.gov [englishlanguage-bounces at nifl.gov] On
Behalf Of Ted Klein [taklein at austin.rr.com]
Sent: Thursday, December 13, 2007 7:20 AM
To: Adult English Language Learners List
Subject: [EnglishLanguage 1988] Students as Sources; Vocabulary Development
in ESL

I keep hearing mention of "student-centered teaching activities" as well as
various sources of vocabulary development. Several years ago I made what
should have been an obvious discovery. The students themselves are the very
best source of the vocabulary that they need. I observed several classes in
which I felt that ESL teachers were truly inflicting too many of their own
interests in vocabulary presentations. One instructor was an audio buff. He
spent an hour teaching audio equipment/high fidelity terminology to
students, who I felt were not getting the message because of their
comprehension levels and also disinterest. Their needs were quite basic.
They wanted to communicate in the real world in which they were coping with
a new language, a new culture and lots of surprises. What I do once a week
with my adult immigrant students is have vocabulary day. The good news is
that the students provide the vocabulary and I do my best to fill the gaps
that they have discovered. The bad news is possible instructor embarrassment
at some of the words that the students have encountered! It's good that
we're all adults.  Here is the form that we use, as well as the procedures:

                                          

 

 

                                    NEW VOCABULARY WORDS

 

 

Name____________________________           Date_________________

 

 

Make a list of five new vocabulary words that you have heard or seen this
week. If you know a word and don't know how to use it, put it on your list.
Make a note on where you found this word and what sentence it was in.

 

 
NOTES:

1.­­­­­­­­­­­­­­____________________________________      

 

 

2.____________________________________

 

 

3.____________________________________

 

 

4.____________________________________

 

 

5.____________________________________

 

 

Put the above words in a sentence after your instructor has explained them.

 

 

1.___________________________________________________________

 

 

2.___________________________________________________________

 

 

3.___________________________________________________________

 

 

4.___________________________________________________________

 

 

5.___________________________________________________________

 

 

PROCEDURES:

 

1. The students turn in the above form with their new words. 

 

2. The instructor puts all of the words received on the marker board, each
with primary stress marked above written vowels and digraphs; e.g.
"phótograph, photógrapher, photográphic photógraphy."   Familiarity with
primary stress is a critical feature if students are to be understood in the
real world.

 

3. After all of the words are up, each word is explained is simple written
English, "acted out" or illustrated with a sketch. Many nouns can be drawn
and most verbs can be acted out. Use of L2/L1 dictionaries is discouraged.
Functional words such as "only" are put in parentheses for special treatment
and explanation after the basic list is covered. Meanings are discussed in
simple English, even though I'm functional in some other languages. Short
simple sentences are made with the words.

 

4. Next is repetition time. Each word is repeated at least twice by class
members. At this time students are asked to identify vowel sounds
numerically, as I talked about in a previous letter; heed 1,  hid  2, hayed
3, head 4,  had 5,  hod 6,  hawed 7,  hoed 8,  hood  9,  who'd  10,  Hud
11,   hide  6+2,  howl  6+9,  boil   7+2. 

 

 

ADVANTAGES

 

1. Students come in with words that they have heard at work, from friends
and have read on signs, in newspapers and books. These are the words that
they want to know and that they need. Most enjoy the process.

 

2. All of the class members get to share in new words that their classmates
have picked up.

 

3. Sounds are identified and reinforced, including suprasegmental primary
stress.

 

4. Reading skills are enhanced by recognition.

 

5. Discussions of meanings among students and with the instructor are high
value catalysts for communication.

 

 

      Theodore A. (Ted) Klein, Jr.
  Independent Consultant in Language
         and Intercultural Training
              Austin, Texas 
       taklein at austin.rr.com
      www.tedklein-ESL.com     
             

 


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


  _____  


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