Reading and Writing for Success

Abstract

In English education system in Korea, it is difficult to teach students at many different levels. In most public schools, teachers usually have to set their target at intermediate and lower level students. Therefore, most of the students are busy translating the reading passages and only concerned with the product; it definitely prevents students moving up to a higher level. Students might be good at simple translation but not able to read and write fluently and logically and think critically. In fact, students rarely get a chance to get appropriate guidance with the process of reading and writing using a top-down approach. The group of students I seek to address is 10~12 years-old, 4~6th grade students whose second language is English. The target learner’s educational situation is private institutions, where the class is taught in a small group of about 5~6 students. I have chosen this target group of students because this is an age when students are able to read and write with critical way of thinking, as well as, understand the logical structures of written work. The target audience needs guidance to read and write focusing on the process. In my textbook I will use a process approach and top-down approach, as well as, task-based language teaching to teach reading and writing. For reading, the activities will allow the students to practice identifying the purpose of the reading. Also I will encourage students to skim the text for main ideas, as well as, scan the text for specific information (Brown, 2007, p.366). For writing, I will connect reading and writing to get schema for both contents and structure of the written piece. Incorporating the reading, students will be able to spend more time prewriting to get schema, organizing one’s thoughts and planning one’s own writing autonomously. Moreover, I will make sure both process and product are well balanced throughout the book. During the writing process, students will go through three stages of writing: prewriting, drafting and revising. Prewriting will contain skimming and scanning a passage, brainstorming, discussing a topic and even free writing. In drafting and revising students will be monitoring themselves, as well as, getting feedback from their peers and teachers (Brown, 2007, p.403). To add, all the reading and writing will be adapting task-based instruction to involve “learners in comprehending, manipulating, producing, or interacting in the target language” (Nunan, 1999, p.25). In order for students to read and write analyzing the structure of the written work, they need to go through such process: for example, listing, ordering and sorting, comparing, problem solving, sharing personal experience and creative brainstorming (Richards & Rogers, 2001, p.234). Therefore, task will allow students to focus on the process while they are using the learned language and interacting with classmates in order to finish the given task. In other words, learners will be able to learn language by interacting communicatively and purposefully with critical thinking while engaged in the activities and task (Richards & Rogers, 2001, p.224). First of all, I will describe the overall concept of the book. For each unit of the book, first, students will get a reading passage to read. The passages will have different types of writing, such as compare and contrast, process and cause and effect. After reading the passage, students will go over vocabulary and comprehension questions followed by topic-related discussion questions to expand their schema. Then teacher and student will spend some time to see the structure of the passage and what kind of language cues he had used; for example, how the writer compared two animals or cause and effect of some problems. After analyzing the format, the book will give students a writing topic that they should discuss and eventually plan for their writing. After the whole process of brainstorming and planning, the book will encourage students to write a draft and revise it based on feedback from their teachers and peers. For the specific chapter, I will focus on identifying fact and opinion. Students will get a reading passage about a persuasive written work. In this passage, I will describe some super hero and evaluate whether they are great or not. There will be both facts and personal opinion about super hero. After student read this passage, they will go over some vocabulary and comprehension questions. Then, they will find specific examples and distinguish whether it was fact or opinion. After analyzing, students will find a topic and discuss in groups about facts they know about that topic. In groups or pairs students will brainstorm and discuss the facts they already know or if the class environment allows, students will go on online to search for information. Then later they will list the information drawing their personal opinion over the topic. For the final task, student will produce a short persuasive passage giving both facts and opinion over the topic. By studying with my textbook students should be able to read and write logically with critical thinking. They would understand the common structure of the English writing through reading and also writing on their own. As students read a passage, they should be able to recognize the types and the structure of writing. Moreover, when students are asked to write, they would remember the process of prewriting, drafting and revising autonomously; eventually writing a final product using the process learned from the book. Due to the needs of my target group, I believe my textbook will address process and top-down approached reading and writing. This book helps students to become autonomous readers and writers with critical thinking skill, who enjoy the complete process of reading and writing.