Reading+in+general

The following is what I think is relevant of the article by Lawrence. This falls under the categorey of strategy instruction or, as Carol suggests, teacher as facilitator. Lawerence L. (2007). Cognition and metacognition Reading Strategies Revisited: Implications for Instructions. The Reading Matrix. 7:1 pp 55 - The main purpose in this article is to present the research outlining strategy instruction and the benefits of it, in particular to bilingual students Lawrence discusses cognitive and metacognitive reading strategies and the use of them particularly among bilingual students. It distinguishes between the two types of strategies. Lawrene also discusses Four main reading approaches that focus on strategy instruction are discussed: Experience-Text-Relationship (ETR), Reciprocal Teaching Approach(RTA), Cognitive Academic Language Learning Approach (CALLA) and Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (SIOP). He first defines Cognitive and metacognitive reading strategies based on earlier researches and studies. He Chamot and O'Malley(1996) as they define the cogniyive reading strategies as those that enable students to accomplish a reading task. He also cites Oxford(1990) who further describes the cognitive strategies such as note taking, summarizing, inferencing, using prior knowledge, predicting, analyzing, and using context clues. While she secribes the metacognitive strategies which involve self-reflection and thinking about reading and learning. The t hree aspects of metacognition include: Citing (Paris, Cross, &Lipson, 1984) Lawrence depicts the importance of strategy instruction especially for bilingual students based on a research where he found that The bilingual students were found to use fewer metacognitive strategies and used cognitive strategies less frequently than their peers. Ie monolingual students. Bilingual students reported using more of the strategies that are found to be negatively related to students’ reading success. They were found to read words over and over again and skip large sections of the reading passages. Clearly, strategy instruction with bilingual students at an early age is necessary before students begin to develop negative reading habits. Five necessary parts of instruction: Lawrence then gives five necessary parts for strategy instructions which are in fact related to the three kinds of metacognitive knowledge: declarative knowledge, procedural knowledge, and conditional knowledge( stated above) : ( There are related to declarative knowledge)\ ( steps 4 and 5 address conditional knowledge) Instructional Approaches Lawrence admits that although there are numerous strategy approaches in reading, there are fewer approches that teach bilingual students to be effective meaning-makers. The four strategy approaches that Lawerence believe have been successfully used preliminary with bilingual students are the ones stated at the beginning : What follows is my summary of Lawrence's description of each approach and its implication in L2 reading The ETR method builds on prior knowledge and experience The students exposed to the ETR approach improved their comprehension of TOEFL passages the most and were able to create semantic maps without scaffolding (Carrell, Pharis, & Liberto, 1989). Lawrence shows the importance of activitating and building on the student's prior knowledge and experience.He give three basic steps of the ETR : Experience, Text and relationship. a- in the experience part, the teacher invites the students to discuss some prior knowledge or experience they have regardng some aspect of the text. The teacher adds to the discussion by questioning the students. This helps create a motivational reading environment. b- Teacher instructed the students by reading certain parts of the text continually questioning them to monitor close comprehension. c- The teacher relates what was discussed in prior knowledge with the text discussion Although the approach is often used with young, less proficient language learners, it has been found to be successful with older, more proficient students (Carrell, Pharis, & Liberto, 1989). RTA is based upon a cognitive-constructivist philosophy of reading Reading is seen as a meaning-making process in which the reader uses his prior knowledge to gain understanding. Scaffolding is at the heart of the RTA and generally the teacher models four reading strategies including: Generating questions, clarifying issues, summarizing and making predictions While the teacher initially instructs the students about the strategies, gradually the responsibility is transferred to the students. The students are often divided into groups, and the text is read silently and orally by one of the students or the teacher, depending on the language level of the group. The leader of the group initiates the discussion by summarizing the text, asking questions, clarifying misunderstandings and generating predictions. Students, receiving both the ETR and the RTA, were found to use cognitive strategies such as activating prior knowledge and summarizing more frequently and finding the main idea more often. The students also were found to use more metacognitive strategies such as monitoring their comprehension and alternating plans. CALLA , originally developed by Anna Chamot and Michael O’Malley in 1987, is based upon cognitive learning in which bilingual learners apply prior knowledge and other strategies,such as making inferences and monitoring comprehension to content area subjects In CALLA, strategies are broken down into cognitive ones, metacognitive ones and social/affective strategies. It is recommended that a small number of strategies be introduced and taught so that students can feel successful with them. Some strategies such as activating prior knowledge and inferencing are so interrelated that they can be introduced together. The teacher both instructs and supports students with the process since not all students will feel at ease with the strategies. ( Carol gives a more detailed view of this one and the FORSEE) The SIOP, originally developed by Deborah Short and Jane Echevarria in 1999, is similar to CALLA in that its purpose is to enable students to develop their language skills within content area subjects while implementing effective strategies. SIOP is based on the notion that effective content teaching of second language students needs to incorporate both content and language objectives, provide strategy instruction and practice; provide opportunities for interaction and assessment. Like CALLA, SIOP is often implemented with secondary language learners. Key vocabulary is introduced, written, repeated and highlighted within the reading.After the reading and lesson, students further review the vocabulary. Students are also given many opportunities to use strategies such as predicting, organizing, summarizing, categorizing, evaluating and self-monitoring; they are given times to self-evaluate their strategy use.
 * 1) Declarative knowledge, such as knowing what the strategy is
 * 2) procedural knowledge, such as knowing how the strategy works
 * 3) conditional knowledge; knowing why the strategy is used
 * 1) First, teachers start by describing the strategy by defining and giving the features of it
 * 2) Second, they need to explain to their students why they are learning the strategy and thus the benefits of this strategy
 * 1) Next, teachers need to show students how the strategy is used, by breaking into components and showing hwo these components are related. Teachers need to provide explicit examples through their own think-alouds. ( procedural knowledge)
 * 2) Teachers then describe when and where the strategy should be used.
 * 3) Finaly, teachers need to show students how to evaluated the effectiveness of the strategy use, and they need to provide additional suggestions to fix strategy problems.
 * 1) Experience-Text-Relationship (ETR),
 * 2) the Reciprocal Teaching Approach (RTA),
 * 3) Cognitive Academic Language Learning Approach (CALLA) and the
 * 4) Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (SIOP).
 * 1) Experience-Text-Relationship
 * 1) Reciprocal Teaching Approach
 * 1) Cognitive Academic Language Learning Approach
 * 1) Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol

Clearly, the strategy instruction of all bilingual students needs to focus on prior knowledge and vocabulary development. These are two critical elements of a successful reading program for all bilingual students. Strategies in these areas, initially with teacher instruction and guidance, enable students to become successful, motivated, independent meaning-makers. ( contribution by Ammar)