Reflections on Reading Comprehension

Student’s name:
Content (s)/ concept( s) Definition(s)/ Views Your own perspectives
1. Reading The process of interaction between a reader and a text (Nuttall To me, Reading is defined as a cognitive process that involves
2005) decoding symbols to arrive at meaning. Reading is an active process
The process of simultaneously extracting and constructing of constructing meanings of words. Reading with a purpose helps the
meaning through interaction and involvement with written reader to direct information towards a goal and focuses their
language (Bernatt) attention. Although the reasons for reading may vary, the primary
The ability to draw meaning from printed page and interpret purpose of reading is to understand the text. Reading is a thinking
this information approriately (Gabe and Stoller) process. It allows the reader to use what he or she may already know,
An interactive process of understanding a subject of specific also called prior knowledge. During this processing of information,
text through which learners use their own knowledge to the reader uses strategies to understand what they are reading, uses
interpret messages and make sense of meaning within the text themes to organize ideas, and uses textual clues to find the meanings
(Nguyen and Nguyen, 2017) of new words. Each of the three components of reading is equally
important.
2. How do you read faster? Extensive reading can be undertaken for either language To me, the ability to read faster can be improved by reading
development or fluency development goals (Hu & Nation, extensively and reading repeatedly, which mean you read a great deal
2000, p.423; Nation & Wang, 1999, p.375) of reading materials and read time over time. By doing these two
Repeated reading requires the learners to read the same text things, you can get much familiar with more vocabulary, grammar
repeatedly, either silently or aloud, which has been found to be and structures, which speeds up your reading.
effective in developing fluency. (Taguchi, Takayasu-Maass, &
Gorsuch, 2004)
Speed reading courses – read for understanding – multiple
choice questions. In these courses, learners are recording both
their speed and their comprehension scores for text so there is
some encouragement to perform at a faster than usual speed.
3. Efferent reading Fact-oriented To me, efferent reading focuses on obtaining the imformation from
Requires learners to personally disengage when reading, to the text without the participating of personal emotion or feeling. In
obtain facts. other words, we put not feeling into the text we read but the
The importance is what remains after the reading – the concentration in looking for the information only.
understanding acquired, the inferences made, the conclusion
developed, the opinions generated.
4. Aesthetic reading Personally and emotionally based To me, in aesthetic reading, readers do not only seek for the
Subjective and personal information but also experience what they read, which means that
What readers are living through – what they see, hear, and feel they have the feelings, emotions over what they read. In other words,
– as they interact with the text is more important. they put themselves into the text, the characters, the events, etc within
the text. They have the feelings for what they read.
5. Components of reading There are two levels of components of reading: To me, reading comprises of 2 basic components. One is at the lower
Lower level: lexical and syntactic (vocabulary and grammar) level consisting of vocabulary and grammar, and the other is at the
Higher level: background knowledge and inferencing higher level consisting of background knowledge and assumption
(assumption) about the text.
6. Extensive reading Reading large amount to obtain an overall understanding of To me, extensive reading means to read extensively, a large amount
the material (Bamford and Day, 1997) of reading materials. Also, in extensive reading, readers read the text
Extensive reading acts as an approach to teaching reading may for enjoyment and to develop general reading skills.
be thought of in terms of purpose or outcome: Beatrice
Mikulecky, for example, calls it pleasure reading (1990).
Extensive reading refers to providing large quantities of easily
comprehensible English books to students, thereby improving
the students' reading proficiency, while allowing them to
enjoy the learning process (Day & Bamford, 1998).
Day and Bamford (1998) propose that one of the purposes of
extensive reading is to increase students' enjoyment of
 reading.
7. Intensive reading Approaching the text under the guidance of the teacher To me, intensive reading means to read with full of concentration and
(Carrell and Carson, 1997) complete focus. It is not about the quantity of reading materials but
Arriving at a detailed understanding of the text (What it means about the quality. Therefore, in intensive reading, people read for
and the meaning is produced) understanding the details, the information within the text.
An intensive reading is a method of reading through which To read intensively demands having an all round focus and
readers acquire in depth, thorough, detailed and concentration while reading a piece in order to have the best available
comprehensive perusal and assimilation of a written piece. understanding of the content and concepts. Whilst extensive reading
(Edeh, 2022) goes horizontal, intensive reading goes vertical.
8. Critical thinking According to Robert Stemberg, critical thinking is “the mental To me, critical thinking is the ability to think of many aspects of one
process, strategies and representations people use to solve issue logically and critically, to make comparison, evaluation, and
problems, make decisions and learn new concepts” jugdement about the subject of matter. Sometimes, critical thinking is
According to Robert Ennis, critical thinking is “reasonable the ability to think forward and backward, to examine the truth of
relfective thinking that is focused on deciding what to believe something.
and do”
9. Transactional Constructivist in nature To me, transactional is the exchange between the reader and the text.
All readers have individualized reading experiences because It is an interplay process between the reader and the text, where the
each reader has unique background schemas (Rosenblatt) reader actively choose and synthesize potential, and the text
Every individual is unique with regard to what constitues his contributes to shaping of those selections and hypotheses. In other
or her schema in any particular area. words, the text and the reader keeps influencing each other
The transactional theory signifies that both the reader and the continually in the reading comprehension process.
text play important roles in the formation of meaning.
Meaning is produced by continuous transaction between the
reader and the text, employing the meaning potential of the
text and the reader's experiential reservoir. While the reader is
active in selecting and synthesizing the potential in his
 reservoir, the text contributes to the shaping of his selection
and hypotheses, resulting in an interplay between them.
(Agung Marhaeni, 2016)
10. Top-down model We draw on our own intelligence and experience – the To me, in top-down model, we try to consider the text as a whole and
predictions we can make, based on the schemata we have relate it to our own knowledge and experience to make sense of the
acquired – to understand the text. (Nuttall, 2005, p.16) details within the text. By doing this, we can see the overall purpose
We interpret assumptions and draw inferences. (Nuttall, 2005) of the writer, so we can understand parts or details of the text much
We try to see the overall purpose of the text, or get a rough easier. Therefore, we can make sense of diffucult parts of the text.
idea of the pattern of the writer’s argument, in order to make a
reasoned guess at the next step. (Nuttall, 2005, p.16)
11. Bottom-up model The readers build up a meaning from the black marks on the To me, in bottom-up model, we try to understand details of the text
page: recognizing letters and words, working out sentence (from every single vocabulary to sentences) and then connect those
structure. (Nuttall, 2005, p.17) understanding - to make a whole vision (or understanding) of the
Bottom-up processing can be used as a corrective to tunnel text.
vision (seeing things only from our own limited point of
view). (Nuttall, 2005, p.17)
12. Interactive model Interactive model suggests that in practice, a reader To me, interative model is a model of processing a text where readers
continually shifts from one focus to another; now adopting a shift from the two basic models, bottom-up and top-down,
top-down approach to predict the probable meaning, then continually. At first, a reader applies top-down model to guess the
moving to the bottom-up approach to check whether that is meaning of the text as a whole, then he/she applies bottom-up model
really what the writer says. (Nuttall, 2005, p.17) to check if their guesses are correct or not, in the comparison with the
purpose of the writer.
13. Word recognition Word recognition as a receptive skill, and word use as an To me, word recognition is the ability to recognise a word
model expressive skill, are components of oral-language immediately and effortlessly with a glance at it.
development and proficiency. Word recognition refers to a
component process of language. Word recognition transforms
 written and spoken forms of words into linguistic
representations (Garnett, 2011)
14. Dual-coding model Dual-coding shows that human perception is divided into two To me, human being percieve this world through two systems, visual
processing systems: visual and verbal. The visual system and verbal. It is the same case in reading. People process and
processes graphic information, and the verbal system recognize a word not only by hearing the sound of that word but also
processes language. Words and images are mentally encoded by the written form, a visual one, of that word. Dual-coding suggests
and decoded in different ways (Paivio, 1991) that it is the best to process a word both visually and verbally in order
According to the dual coding approach (Paivio, 1990), stimuli to have the best absorption, storage, and retrieval of information.
are recorded in memory by verbal coding, visual coding, or
both. Of these three routes, the use of both visual and verbal
coding enables the best absorption, storage, and retrieval of
information. Previous research has shown that using visual
and verbal coding to process pictorial information supported
by verbal information provides the best results (e.g., Xue &
Muralidharan, 2015). In particular, visual advertising activates
visual as well as oral codes for storing information for future
recall (Paivio, 1990).
15. Schema theory Another constructivist theory To me, schema is everything a person knows about something. These
People organize everything they know into schemas, or knowledges comes from past experience. In my opinion, schema is
knowledge structures. one’s background knowledge about something or someone. For
Knowledge structures are pliant and expandable example, when a person is going to talk or encounter the topic about
*Anderson and Pearson (1984): an active organization of past fast, he or she may recall everything that he/she knows/remember
reactions, or past experience) about that topic and relates those knowledge/ experience to the
Readers have schemas for content, schemas for reading current subject of matter so that he/she can better explain and
process (decoding, skimming, inferencing, and summarizing) understand it.
and for different types of text.
16. Metacognition A process of thinking about thinking -> students’ learning To me, metecognition involves your awareness of (knowing) when
process you know and when you do not know, and knowing what to do when
Metacognition is the ability to be aware of and control one’s you do not know. In other words, it involves self-monitoring and
own cognitive processes (Baker, 2002) correcting your own learning processes.
Interaction between Teachers and learners in the form of
asking and answering (questioning)
17. Constructivism A theory of learning that emphasizes the active construction of To me, constructivism is a learning style that learners construct the
knowledge by individuals (Woolfolk, 1999) knowledge actively by themselves.
Learning happens when learners Intergrate new knowledge
withh existing knowledge -> occur only when the learner is
actively engaged in the learning process.
Theory of learning (Fosnot, 1996; Richardson, 2003; Yilmaz,
2008)
Activity, discourse, reflection -> learning is a process
(Yilmaz, 2008)
How knowledge is created (Barllet, 1932)
Learning is a natural and ongoing state of mind
Hypothesis-testing experience
Inferencing or fill the meaning gap (Ruddell and Ruddell,
1995), or reading between the lines
Constructivist theory:
Learners centered -> the lesson plan depends on learning,
rather than teaching. -> Whole reading.
18. ZPD Developed by Vygotsky 1978– Zone of proximal development To me, ZDP is about what learners can do with the guidance from
– is about what learners can do with guidance. teachers at the time.
What learners can accomplish with assistance of someone else (a
 teahcer, a mentor, a parent, or a knowledgable peer)
19. Scaffolding According to the Glossary of Education Reform (2014), To me, scaffolding is a teaching technique where teachers provide
“Scaffolding refers to a variety of instructional techniques successive levels of support that help students to reach to higher
used to move students progressively toward stronger levels of comprehension that they would not have been able to
understanding and, ultimately, greater independence in the achieve without help. Then, the supportive strategies are gradually
learning process.” removed when they are no longer needed and the teachers shifts more
responsibility over to the students.
20. Integrated Integrated instruction is a method for organizing instruction to To me, integrated instruction means to combine more than one
instruction synthesize more than one subject area, rather than separating instruction together instead of applying them sepately.
instruction by subject area.
21. Whole language A philosophy about how children learn from which educators To me, whole language suggests that language should be viewed as a
derive strategies for teaching. whole and taught as a whole, which means all the language skill,
It suggests that reading like oral language is a natural process listening, speaking, reading, and writing, are intertwined with each
that children will acquire if immersed in high-quality literacy other.
environments and exposed to meaningful, authentic literacy
experiences and high quality literature.
Also, it is believed that listening, speaking, reading, and
writing are all interconnected, and that advances in any one
area will produce advances in the other areas.
It is a learning approach or attitude that views language as a
whole entity.
22. Strategy instruction Teaching students about strategies, teaching them how and To me, “strategy instructions” means teaching students the strategies,
when to use strategies, helping student identify personally as well as the way and under what conditions to use those strategies.
effective strategies, and encouraging them to make strategic Besides, teachers also helps students figure out what strategies are the
behaviors part of their learning schema. most effective and appropriate to themselves because there is no-one-
fits-all stratery for everyone, one strategy can be very effective to this
person may not be that effective to others.