Week 6: Readers, Ms. Lee MH (Excellent)

TSL 509 Extensive Reading Review

2010-09-24

Oxford Bookworms Library Graded Readers’ Series ( for ESL Starter Learners)   1.      Burrows, Phillip & Foster, Mark (2008). Starman (PP1-40). Hong Kong: Oxford University Press 2.      Twain, Mark (2008). A ConnecticutYankee in King Arthur’s Court (PP1-40). Hong Kong: Oxford University Press 3.      Brooke, Helen (2008). Survive (PP 1-40). Hong Kong: Oxford University Press

 

     Extensive reading provides readers with a killing-two-birds-with-one-stone effect. Readers acquire language naturally while reading as many as books which are appropriate for the learners’ level and interest. At the same time, the books they are supposed to read are easy enough with virtually no unknown words to give pleasure of reading them, which hooks learners to be a life-long reader. This approach focuses on developing fluent reading skills by providing the conditions for meaning-focused input. The effects of extensive reading have been proved successful in language acquisition, since books play a role of language input, motivating and natural. Now in Korea as well as in English-speaking countries, readers’ series, which are strategically designed for fluency development, are in trend and under the way to be adopted into a school-based English syllabus.

     Readers’ series did not attract much attention of Korean educators and parents until recent a few years ago. Unfortunately, I was not a beneficiary of Graded readers’ series, when I learned English in my childhood. Three copies of a starting level of books in Oxford Bookworms Library are the first graded readers’ series I was first exposed to. When I read these books while having my hair done, I was so soaked in books that I was “brain-dyed” to be a book-addict for a couple of hours reading and appreciating. Even my hair-dresser was interested in the books for her adolescent children. I became a missionary to spread the good news “how to make your kids love English”. I wish I had known the pleasure of reading earlier when I first learned English. I would have been more fluent in reading and speaking based on systematically built-up vocabulary and subconscious learning of English structure. Also, I would have been a more positive English learner who has learned the pleasure of reading English books.

    Three copies of Oxford Bookworms series share the common features as they are written for ESL starters or English learners whose Toeic score is around 300 points. For instance, every book in this start level contains around 250 headwords involving ranging from 900 words to 1,600 words in total. The language features in the books are simple and basic. For example, tense in the books is mostly simple present, present progressive, or simple future in simple clauses involving many interrogative or imperative sentences. Not many modals are used but ‘can, must, be going to, or will’. Gerunds and to-infinitives are shown, but relative clauses are rarely observed in the books. Root verbs and simple words are repetitively used. Each book consists of 40 pages inserted with colorful pictures followed by glossary and activities for before reading, while-reading, and after-reading to help readers’ understanding and motivate readers. Distinct feature differentiating each from the others is the format of the books. There are three formats of the books – narrative, interactive, and cartoon strips, depending on the subject of the book. Starman chooses a narrative style in which the author tells chronologically how Bill meets a man named John Phillips on the hot and dry road in Australia, and what strange things happen related to the strange John. In the story, the author lets readers follow the story mostly consisting of dialogue and description of characters and behaviors, and guess what this book implies. In the meanwhile, Survive picks an interactive style in which each reader follows the number of sentences by responding to the given situation. In result, readers are supposed to read the whole sentences and learn the best solution to the situation of plane crash. This format made really fascinating by integrating a problem-solution task-oriented reading with an active reading technique by which readers’ choice determines the following content. This reading was like solving a puzzle or a maze learning. Lastly, Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court is formatted in cartoon strips. Considering the age and level of readers, a cartoon-formatted book appeals to the initial English reading starters, as interesting picture cues help readers understand the content without much effort by providing a context, and the number of words is limited and colloquial-based. Even among the same level of books, in my opinion, a cartoon-style book is more beneficial for earlier-stage learners, while a narrative-style book is for older and more trained learners. Exploring different style of books would give readers much diverse experiences to read and pleasure. Though the level is solely determined by the number of headwords in each book, styles of format such as narrative, cartoon, or narrative, styles of narration such as colloquial or written English, picture cues, and so forth would be the factors for which readers choose their books. Teachers should motivate students by guiding them to explore various genres of books and providing opportunities to express their opinion in recommending and commenting on the books they read.

     My experience of reading this Oxford graded readers’ series interested me to train myself to be an extensive reader with such systematic reading materials. Also, thinking of my intense pleasure of reading, and feeling of success, since I could get three books done within an hour, I believe my students also benefit from the extensive reading program with graded readers’ books, because it would ensure linguistic competence with step-by-step natural exposure to language input, and psychological competence with pleasure of reading.

 

 

Your review on readers series is, overall, well organized and analyctic which can serve as a good writing example to your classmates, I believe. I would like to hear from you more about how you are planning to apply this 'readers series' in your classroom setting.  Thank you.