Background
Different text genres have different target audiences and different structures you can introduce to students. Texts provide a good foundation for learning new language. By introducing different text genres students are introduced to different ways of using the English language: slang, metaphors, formal and informal language. Texts can train listening and reading skills, and provide a foundation to train the productive skills: writing and speaking.
Students have different learning abilities and academic needs that you have to consider when constructing your teaching. The different text genres provide you with an opportunity of tailoring your teaching to meet these needs.
Texts can be provided in all ranges of genres: Novels, short stories, poems, advertisements. Street signs, word lists, news paper articles etc. All of these genres provide different language and structures which students need to know about. Furthermore, texts can be presented orally. By presenting texts orally students are introduced to different accents as well as how words are pronounced.
Research question
How can teachers work with different text genres with a focus on different skills?
Theory
When reading a text readers have different styles of reading technique they can apply.
Such reading techniques include:
Receptive reading, reflective reading, skim reading, scanning, and intensive reading. (Hedge, p.195)
The different reading styles can be applied in all reading genres, but it is also imperative to introduce the different techniques according to the learning objective of the reading.
If you look at the concept of receptive reading, a technique you could teach your students is to look for patterns in a specific text. An editorial in a newspaper, i.e., could contain some negative utterances that highlight the opinion and mood of the writer.
Reflective reading is a technique that the reader can apply when comparing statements or beliefs to previous ones (back tracking).
Skim reading is useful when readers flick through a text and try to sort out the headlines and the first sentences of the following paragraphs, to get the overall understanding of the content.
Scanning involves reading rapidly through a text, searching to get the overall gist of the content. This technique can be supported by providing students with pieces of information to search for.
Intensive reading is used when readers read for the specific.
Gibbons states that: “The process of listening is in many ways similar to the process of reading” (Gibbons 2002, 102), therefore, when teaching text a focus on both listening and reading can be beneficial.
For younger students a good genre to teach is stories. If a story is supported by pictures or drawings, these can support the students to understand unfamiliar language (Cameron 2011, 163). Moreover, in stories pieces of language are often used over and over again. This reuse of the language helps students learn new words or chunks (Cameron 2011, 164).
When introducing students to an unfamiliar text, one way to support the learning is to pre-teach new language. The pre-taught language should especially support the understanding of the plot in the story (Cameron 169). Another feature to be aware of is the fact that in order for students to remember the words they have been taught, the words needs to be reused several times. Because if students are only taught words that they need to remember in order to understand a text, the words are stored in their short term memory, and these words are not remembered. A way for words to be stored in the long term memory is by it being used frequently (Henriksen 1995, 45).
When students in grade nine have their final written exam they are asked to produce a piece of free writing within a specific genre (Folkeskolens afgangsprøve 2008, hæfte 2, 68). When completing this task the students need to know what each genre is about in order to write a good paragraph (Christie 2001, 86). In order for the students to know about different genres, they should be presented to a variety of genres and have had the opportunity to work with them.
Besides offering opportunities to get an understanding of how different genres are structured, texts also provide an opportunity for students to gain knowledge of how different cultures are (Cameron 2011, 168).
Discussion
The use of texts can provide a variety of opportunities, students can learn about: genres, culture, language, pronunciation e.g.
When selecting the text genres to work on it is important to have an aim and focus area of the reading or listening skills. Yes, but I suppose also a thought to which genres students these days need to know in order to get on in the world.
If the focus is on reading the teacher should introduce the main objectives and purposes of the reading.
A genre like short stories can be introduced as a way of looking at structures and language form. Is the story told in a narrative way or is it based on dialogues? Narrative texts concern the series of events in a story. Dialogues are used as a way of illustrating the story, usually expressed by the characters (Cameron 2011, 165). Being able to distinguish between these two variations of form helps the reader setting the particular atmosphere of the story, and comprehending how these two ways of writing intertwine. Furthermore, when reading, students should be conscious about which reading strategy they should use. In the written exam at the end of grade nine, the students have to read different kinds of texts, and afterwards answer questions (Folkskolens afgangsprøve 2008, hæfte 1). If the students know of the different reading techniques they don’t have to read all of the texts in depth, but can skim some of them. Since there is a time limit to the test, the proper technique can be time saving, and give students more time for other tasks.
If the aim of the text is with a focus on listening skills teachers should provided language that the students have already met. By doing this the language is recycled. New language should also be introduced, and if some of the new language is essential to know in order for the students to understand the plot, the language should be pre taught (Cameron 169). When listening to stories from different English speaking countries, students should be introduced to different accents which reflect where the story is from. This does not only provide the students with knowledge about how many varieties of English there are in the world, it also provides them with a tool to sound more authentic which is one of the objectives in English teaching (lectures on Phonetics by Warnsby 2011). Some newer task books provide students with a CD, where the texts from the reading book are read in the native accent (Carter 2009, back cover)
If going into more specific details when working with texts students can have a focus on grammar.
“If something is said to be in the active voice, it means that you express it in such a way that the agent or actor responsible for the action is made active; any other person, thing, or animal ‘receives’ the action, or is ‘passive’, because the action is done to them. In the active voice, the agent or actor who acts is also the subject of the verb. But if something is said to be in the passive voice, it means that the animal, thing, or person that is the ‘receiver’ of the action is put first, while the actor or the agent responsible for the action is placed in a different role, usually expressed by the use of the preposition “by””. (Christie & Soosai 2001, 109).
Teaching your students how to distinguish between the different meanings of the two forms, in order to understand the meaning of the text, gives them an important tool to interpret the content. This will also provide students with a greater knowledge of how to write on their own.
Practical examples:
In Jeremy Harmer “The Practice of English Language Teaching”, 4th ed.2007, p.288, there is a practical example of an activity you can introduce to your students as a way of creating their own comprehension task for a text.
If the text is about people, events, or topics, which everyone knows something about, discuss the subject of the text with the class before they read. This way you will work on their pre-knowledge of the topic and generate a common understanding, a common ground in the class. With pre-knowledge of the text they are about to read, you activate the appropriate schemata in your pupils’ brains.
Draw a chart on the board and have them fill it in under such categories as:
Things I/we know, Things I/we are not sure of, Things I/we would like to know
Every category is referring to the subject of the text.
As a lead-in this provides an opportunity for the students to be engaged, and activate their schemata. In the end, it provides them with a sensible reason for actually carrying out the reading.
They will have fix points to read for that they, themselves, singled out.
They read the text to check off all the items they have put into the three columns.
The exercise might not provide the students with all the answers for their questions, but , hopefully, they will read more enthusiastically, having a self-formulated and regulated reason for doing so.
Another practical example:
This learning activity is taken from Christie & Soosai “Language and Meaning”, p. 109-110, section 7.4:
This is an example of how an exercise can be carried out when the focus is on the passive and active voice. It provides examples for the students which they can adapt when doing learning activity 7.4. Exercises dealing with the active and passive voice help students to focus on how to structure a sentence which has the meaning they intend. Furthermore, the students are introduced to the use of the preposition “by”, and change of the verb (Christie 2001, 109)
List of references:
Cameron, Lynne (2011, 14th edition) Teaching Languages to Young Learners. Language Teaching Library. Cambridge University Press
Christie & Soosai, (2001) Language and Meaning. MacMillan
Harmer, Jeremy (2007, 4th edition) The Practice of English Language Teaching. Pearson Longman
Hedge, Tricia (2000) Teaching and Learning in the Language Classroom. Oxford Handbooks for Language Teachers: Oxford University Press
Warnsby, Anna (2011) Lectures on English Phonetics at Malmö Högskola
Carter, Chris., Kendon, T., Buhl, M. D., Hansen, D. J. (2009) Pit Stop Text Book #9 CD. Alinea
Folkeskolens Afgangsprøve Engelsk maj 2008, Hæfte 1 og 2
Henriksen, Birgit (2009) Theme: A word’s a word, Sprogforum no.3
