I hate reading.
Just kidding, I love reading, but many of my students do not. Boo.
I ask my students why they dislike reading and they say:
- “It’s boring.”
- “I’m not interested in the material.”
- “It takes too long.”
- “I don’t understand.”
- “I don’t care.”
Many students don’t enjoy reading in English, let alone in another language. I’ll be honest, I have avoided assigning many reading activities for fear of “wasting time” and for lack of student engagement. The reading assignments I do give are usually for homework, on something that isn’t particularly exciting for adolescents (holler, Aztec Empire!). I threaten with a reading “quiz” the next day, and what do you know? Most kids don’t do well on the reading quiz! Why?
1. They didn’t read
2. There aren’t any Sparknotes on that particular text on the Aztec Empire. (shocking, am I right?)
Studies show that to acquire a language more effectively, students must constantly be reading at a level that is appropriate for them, and they should be reading texts that are interesting to them. What do you mean Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Magical Realism do not satisfy these criteria? I struggle internally because if I assign “Independent reading” I see many students staring blankly at a page and all of a sudden everyone has to go to the bathroom, and now I’ve wasted 10 minutes of valuable classroom time, and my students are bored and resentful. So I avoid it. But the studies! And now I have the “teacher guilties”…
Recently I attended a workshop by Mike Peto on Comprehensible Input in the language classroom. He HIGHLY emphasized independent reading for students to acquire language. He also insisted that students must be reading books that are appealing to them. This means, students can pick and choose their topic of interest and level (as long as it’s in Spanish, in this case). This also reaquires a well-developed language book library that has been cultivated over the years, and I don’t have one. Sad. 🙁
I also recently attended a webinar by Bryan Kandel titled “Succeeding with Novels in the Language Classroom”.
In his webinar, Bryan emphasized the importance of reading to gain language input. The task is to make reading ENJOYABLE for students by using compelling texts. “Compelling texts contain the following:
- humor
- relevance
- unexpected, incredible details
- debate”.
If a text contains these elements, students will enjoy reading. Yeah…Okay.
In this webinar there were several techniques and strategies for a teacher to use to engage students in reading and coaxing them to enjoy reading. One strategy really stuck out for me:
SCREENCAST A READING OUTLOUD. This screencast is from a mini novel titled “¿Dónde Está Eduardo? by Blaine Ray:
I am not sure if this will work for English teachers, but for language teachers, I find it to be really great. The students can listen and read along, and also use the images, or even film excerpts to associate with the text being read. This provides them with a mental image for what is being described, and they will better associate the vocabulary with the text. They can also hear how the words are supposed to be pronounced, not just how it sounds in their own heads. They can listen to intonation and emotion when the text is being read aloud, which will facilitate reading. Overall this might just be some progress for enjoying reading more in Spanish.
Personally, I find reading harder and harder when I can just get an audio book and listen to it on time and half or watch a how to video. As I listen to more podcasts and would rather watch a cooking video than read a cook book I wonder, do I suck?? Shoot, maybe. Thanks for sharing!
On second thought thought, I am learning a lot more and consuming a lot more content that is actually relevant. So maybe its not so sucky.
Karina, I love your honesty and intentionality in this blog. Students are bombarded by written text in all classes, so they may find it difficult to independently read, especially in another language! The resources you provided are great! A multi-sensory approach to learning is KEY when acquiring language, especially written language. It is also appealing to various learning styles, which is helping all students, not just the few. Thanks for sharing your experience and resources!
Or maybe you found your learning style!!
Ok I love the squeaky voice in the video… And I have a confession… I struggled with reading forever… I survived school because my grandmother read to me out loud every evening… As an adult I avidly read by listening to audibles and this year during our dare to lead book club I wanted to write as I listened thinking the audible would be faster than me as a reader… Turns out that even at 1.5 times speed, I ca read faster than can be spoken… BUT the more important discovery was the reading/listening combo actually made it easier for me to get through dense text (fast forward to courage to teach)… now loving that for work stuff that is too dense to listen and for which my attention span makes me struggle on straight reading… so yeah, I suspect it is a huge support for language learners
Karina, you make several interesting points here. Yes, I absolutely agree that the content that students are asked to read must be engaging and appropriate to their reading level. Over the years I have found that some of the books that I love most fall flat when I bring them into my class. As we redesigned our English 2 curriculum we tried to strike a balance between books that are highly engaging, and books that demonstrate appropriate literary merit (whatever that means!). I like your idea to Screencastify reading, but I think I could use it a different way in English classes. I could see an assignment where my students have to do a close reading, and discuss their thought process while they are reading. I might suggest this as we plan our next unit in English 2, Argumentative Writing. Thanks for sharing and getting my wheels turning.
I read Young Adult books all the time in junior and high school. I would power through a series and could not wait for the next. However, in English class, I would struggle to completely read a book. In college, I completely struggled and only read for what I knew I absolutely had to read. I wish that I had had a different process for reading that would have helped me be engaged like this!