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Teach English in Gaota Zhen - Bazhong Shi

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified and teach in Gaota Zhen? Are you interested in teaching English in Bazhong Shi? Check out ITTT’s online and in-class courses, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English ONLINE or abroad! ITTT offers a wide variety of Online TEFL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language.

Reading is an integral part of the language system and is closely linked to both spoken language and writing. If our children do not learn to read they cannot succeed in life. Students who are most likely at risk for reading failure are students with limited linguistic and cultural backgrounds and their limited exposure to English language. They often lack sufficient oral language and verbal skills and have meager vocabularies. Since reading is the basic skill for all academic subjects, failure in school can be traced to inadequate reading skills. The development of reading skills serves as the major academic foundation for all school based learning. The basic reading skills that students need to acquire are fluency, vocabulary, text comprehension, phonemic awareness, and phonics. Reading fluency is the ability to read connected text rapidly, effortlessly, and automatically. Readers must develop fluency to make the bridge from word recognition to reading comprehension. An effective teacher is able to help students by using the following strategies, read along method where the teacher and one student read a passage together orally. Paired reading where two students read in pairs, alternating pages, paired reading provides extensive reading practice for both students. Echo reading where first, the teacher models an oral reading passage, the student is then asked to imitate the teachers reading. Reading aloud to other audience where children can read aloud to willing listeners such as grandparents, other family members or even the dog. Vocabulary occupies a central position is learning to read. The students’ vocabulary has a significant effect on reading achievement and is strongly related to reading comprehension. Students build their vocabulary knowledge both indirectly and directly. The students should also know the difference between oral vocabulary and reading vocabulary. It is important to recognize that students learn word gradually. Most words require twenty exposures in context before an adequate grasp of their meaning is acquired (McKenna, 2004). The purpose of reading is comprehension, which is, gathering meaning from the printed pages. Reading comprehension is a major problem for many students that seek to learn English as a second language. Some strategies that the teacher should undergo to help students in reading comprehension are comprehension monitoring that enables students to learn how to be aware of their understanding of the material. Cooperative learning where students learn reading strategies together. Using graphic and semantic organizers, including story maps where students make graphic representations of the material to assist their comprehension. Question answering that entitles students answer questions posed by the teacher and receive immediate feedback. Question generation that encourages students to ask themselves questions about various aspects of the story. Story structure where students are taught how to use the structure of the story as a mean of helping them recall story content in order to answer questions about what they have read. Finally summarization where students are taught to integrate ideas and to generalize from the text information. The following methods for teaching reading to ESL students are recommended by Hudson and Smith (2001): build reading fluency, keep a running record of errors, incorporate writing into the lesson, cut up the written story into sentences, and write a new story. The links between reading and oral language and writing should be strengthened. Active experiences with writing and oral reading will improve a child’s reading. Children also need opportunities to engage in reading for enjoyment when they are not under the supervision of a teacher. I don’t believe in the kind of magic in my books, but I do believe something very magical can happen when you READ a good book. (J.K. Rowung, author of the harry potter books.)


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