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Abstract：English reading has always been considered one of the most important parts in English learning. Although most of the college have the Extensive reading as the required course, some students’ reading habits are still very poor. I did an investigation in this paper to find out the reason for the students’ poor reading habit. The result is very interesting. It said that, no matter what kind of teaching methods are used in extensive reading class, if those students who are required to have additional reading tasks and if the material can be selected by the students themselves according to their own interest, they have better reading habit. And they can keep this better habit in their daily studying and reading.
Key words.：Extensive readingstudentsreading materialreading habit
1. The instruction
English reading has always been considered one of the most important parts of foreign language learning. Without reading, nothing can be done in the development of the competence in listening, speaking, writing and translating. Reading courses, especially extensive reading ones, fill up a large component of the language information obtaining. Obviously, students and teacher should pay great attention to the importance of reading courses.
In Canada, children are required to read a flood of extracurricular books when they are in their Primary Schools. Each week, they take books from school and finish their reading at home. In their high school time, they begin to read some selected parts of the original works, and then to read the original books. That is to say, even for the native English speakers, if they want to have efficient language knowledge, and have competent language ability, they have to read a lot. Therefore, if we want to learn English well, we also need plenty of reading. The famous Frank Smith’s slogan said: the best way to improve your knowledge of a foreign language is to go and live among its speakers. The next best way is to read extensively in it”. It is impossible for us to go in the best way, so, we choose the next best way to learn English.
Extensive reading is arranged as one of the required courses in almost all of our country’s colleges. The purpose of this course is to encourage the students to form good reading habits, to improve their reading speed and their comprehensive ability of English material. The techniques are supposed for the students to learn in this course are: 1) understanding the main idea of the reading text. 2) Recognize the topic sentences and the details of the paragraph. 3) Distinguish the facts the author’s ideas. 4) How to infer and get the conclusion of the text 5) how to analyze the authors attitude to the problem discussed in the material. 6) How to skip the text to get the general meaning of the text. 7) How to guess the new words or phrases’ meanings from the context. 7) How to read charts and other types of materials. It encourages the students to read as much as possible. In this way, the students can gain more information, which can’t get from textbook. The more they read, the more vocabulary the may have; and the more they read, the more sense they can feel about the flounce of the language from the text. That means they can learn how to express properly in English through reading. In one word, at the time when the students finish this course, they are supposed to have the ability of reading any daily reading materials, which were written in English, such as newspapers, magazines, advertisements and so on, just like reading in Chinese.
2.The existing problems
Although most of the college have the Extensive reading as the required course, some students’ reading habits are still remain in the way they have before they take this course; and some only use the reading techniques they learned in the Extensive reading course when they have English tests. Most of the students seldom use the effective methods that are introduced in this course.
3.The purpose of my study
Because the above problem exists, what I want to do here is to have an investigation to see why the fact is that: is it because the present teaching of Extensive reading course is not effective, or because our students’ lazy in extensive reading.
4.Research methodology
Investigation:
The subjects in this investigation are the students whose major are English language. They are from different colleges. I listed a number of questions about their extensive reading classes, some questions about their reading habits, and even questions about their language learning approach out of school classroom. At last I asked them to give some suggestions about their extensive reading classes.
5. Result
After I finished my investigations, I classified the papers into two kinds: the first kind is the papers from those students who said that they learned all kinds of reading skills, which are required in the extensive reading syllabus, in their extensive reading classes. The teachers not only teach the students reading skills, but also encourage the students to use these skills in the classroom reading practice. The other kind of papers are those from the students who said that what they do in their extensive reading classes is only read and read and finish the comprehension questions after finish each reading text. They said what their teachers do is just give their reading materials and give the orders to the students for the beginning of their readings. They help the students to time their reading speeds, and encourage the students to read as quickly as possible. Their main purpose is to train the students’ reading speed.
Data analysis
A. From the result of the investigation, I find it is true that all the colleges have the Extensive reading course as one of the required courses for English majors.
B. From the paper, we see that: in most of the extensive reading class, the students have textbooks. If it is necessary the teacher may have some other additional reading materials in English such as newspaper report, anecdotes, and any other type of materials.
C. The subjects whose papers are classified into the first kind occupy about 39% of the whole subjects. Among them 60% of them are required to have more additional reading material, but they can select the material by themselves according to their interests. Only this group of students has formed good reading habits after they finished their Extensive reading courses. They keep their reading habit in their daily reading. All of them get language knowledge from reading newspapers or magazines. They learn the new words that are newly created with the development of science and technology also by reading.
D. In the other group, the number of the subjects occupies 61% of all the subjects. In this group the teachers’ role is just encourage the students to read as quickly as possible. Among them, 75% of the subjects have additional reading task, in which, 60% of them can select the reading material according to their interests. They do this just to ensure the students have enough reading practice when they are outside of class. One interesting thing is that only those subjects who have additional reading tasks outside class and can select the reading material themselves form good reading habits. And they keep this habit in their daily reading, just like those subjects who are in the same condition in the first group.
E. So no matter what kind of teaching methods are used in the Extensive Reading class, the most important thing for the students to form good reading habit is the students themselves. That is reading as much as possible is the best way to form good reading habit. Just as Frank Smith famous slogan said: “we learn to read by reading”.
6. Conclusion
The Extensive reading put emphasis on the effective understanding in the process of fast reading. It is a kind of reading activity for getting the general meaning of the material. The reason for many Chinese students poor in English is because their inadequate reading in English. If we just have reading practice in classroom, it is far more enough. What we do in the reading class is just some reading technique introduction, or some paragraph analysis, all these are do only for the purpose of stimulating the students reading enthusiasm. In the class, most of the teacher only introduce how to have extensive reading, what kind of reading materials is suitable for the students to read.
The reading part itself needs the students to cover. So the students should read according to their language level step by step, from the easy reading material to the original English works, and also the newspapers, magazines, novels, any kinds of articles. We learn any kinds of information knowledge, and even human thoughts through reading. All in all, extensive reading skill is extremely important. Everyone should have the good habit of reading, it a short way of leading you to success.
The Bibliography：
【1】胡壮麟 《对中国英语教育的若干思考》 外语研究2002年第3期
【2】《中国学校外语教学近十多年来的进步》 广东基础教育信息中心 2003年6月20日
【3】《大学英语阅读教学的调查及分析》 《中国大学教学》2004年第1期
【4】曹寅珺 《浅谈英语泛读教学》中国基础教育网。
【5】Christine Nuttall Teaching Reading Skills in A Foreign Language. 2002
（陕西省西北税务学校）
Key words.：Extensive readingstudentsreading materialreading habit
1. The instruction
English reading has always been considered one of the most important parts of foreign language learning. Without reading, nothing can be done in the development of the competence in listening, speaking, writing and translating. Reading courses, especially extensive reading ones, fill up a large component of the language information obtaining. Obviously, students and teacher should pay great attention to the importance of reading courses.
In Canada, children are required to read a flood of extracurricular books when they are in their Primary Schools. Each week, they take books from school and finish their reading at home. In their high school time, they begin to read some selected parts of the original works, and then to read the original books. That is to say, even for the native English speakers, if they want to have efficient language knowledge, and have competent language ability, they have to read a lot. Therefore, if we want to learn English well, we also need plenty of reading. The famous Frank Smith’s slogan said: the best way to improve your knowledge of a foreign language is to go and live among its speakers. The next best way is to read extensively in it”. It is impossible for us to go in the best way, so, we choose the next best way to learn English.
Extensive reading is arranged as one of the required courses in almost all of our country’s colleges. The purpose of this course is to encourage the students to form good reading habits, to improve their reading speed and their comprehensive ability of English material. The techniques are supposed for the students to learn in this course are: 1) understanding the main idea of the reading text. 2) Recognize the topic sentences and the details of the paragraph. 3) Distinguish the facts the author’s ideas. 4) How to infer and get the conclusion of the text 5) how to analyze the authors attitude to the problem discussed in the material. 6) How to skip the text to get the general meaning of the text. 7) How to guess the new words or phrases’ meanings from the context. 7) How to read charts and other types of materials. It encourages the students to read as much as possible. In this way, the students can gain more information, which can’t get from textbook. The more they read, the more vocabulary the may have; and the more they read, the more sense they can feel about the flounce of the language from the text. That means they can learn how to express properly in English through reading. In one word, at the time when the students finish this course, they are supposed to have the ability of reading any daily reading materials, which were written in English, such as newspapers, magazines, advertisements and so on, just like reading in Chinese.
2.The existing problems
Although most of the college have the Extensive reading as the required course, some students’ reading habits are still remain in the way they have before they take this course; and some only use the reading techniques they learned in the Extensive reading course when they have English tests. Most of the students seldom use the effective methods that are introduced in this course.
3.The purpose of my study
Because the above problem exists, what I want to do here is to have an investigation to see why the fact is that: is it because the present teaching of Extensive reading course is not effective, or because our students’ lazy in extensive reading.
4.Research methodology
Investigation:
The subjects in this investigation are the students whose major are English language. They are from different colleges. I listed a number of questions about their extensive reading classes, some questions about their reading habits, and even questions about their language learning approach out of school classroom. At last I asked them to give some suggestions about their extensive reading classes.
5. Result
After I finished my investigations, I classified the papers into two kinds: the first kind is the papers from those students who said that they learned all kinds of reading skills, which are required in the extensive reading syllabus, in their extensive reading classes. The teachers not only teach the students reading skills, but also encourage the students to use these skills in the classroom reading practice. The other kind of papers are those from the students who said that what they do in their extensive reading classes is only read and read and finish the comprehension questions after finish each reading text. They said what their teachers do is just give their reading materials and give the orders to the students for the beginning of their readings. They help the students to time their reading speeds, and encourage the students to read as quickly as possible. Their main purpose is to train the students’ reading speed.
Data analysis
A. From the result of the investigation, I find it is true that all the colleges have the Extensive reading course as one of the required courses for English majors.
B. From the paper, we see that: in most of the extensive reading class, the students have textbooks. If it is necessary the teacher may have some other additional reading materials in English such as newspaper report, anecdotes, and any other type of materials.
C. The subjects whose papers are classified into the first kind occupy about 39% of the whole subjects. Among them 60% of them are required to have more additional reading material, but they can select the material by themselves according to their interests. Only this group of students has formed good reading habits after they finished their Extensive reading courses. They keep their reading habit in their daily reading. All of them get language knowledge from reading newspapers or magazines. They learn the new words that are newly created with the development of science and technology also by reading.
D. In the other group, the number of the subjects occupies 61% of all the subjects. In this group the teachers’ role is just encourage the students to read as quickly as possible. Among them, 75% of the subjects have additional reading task, in which, 60% of them can select the reading material according to their interests. They do this just to ensure the students have enough reading practice when they are outside of class. One interesting thing is that only those subjects who have additional reading tasks outside class and can select the reading material themselves form good reading habits. And they keep this habit in their daily reading, just like those subjects who are in the same condition in the first group.
E. So no matter what kind of teaching methods are used in the Extensive Reading class, the most important thing for the students to form good reading habit is the students themselves. That is reading as much as possible is the best way to form good reading habit. Just as Frank Smith famous slogan said: “we learn to read by reading”.
6. Conclusion
The Extensive reading put emphasis on the effective understanding in the process of fast reading. It is a kind of reading activity for getting the general meaning of the material. The reason for many Chinese students poor in English is because their inadequate reading in English. If we just have reading practice in classroom, it is far more enough. What we do in the reading class is just some reading technique introduction, or some paragraph analysis, all these are do only for the purpose of stimulating the students reading enthusiasm. In the class, most of the teacher only introduce how to have extensive reading, what kind of reading materials is suitable for the students to read.
The reading part itself needs the students to cover. So the students should read according to their language level step by step, from the easy reading material to the original English works, and also the newspapers, magazines, novels, any kinds of articles. We learn any kinds of information knowledge, and even human thoughts through reading. All in all, extensive reading skill is extremely important. Everyone should have the good habit of reading, it a short way of leading you to success.
The Bibliography：
【1】胡壮麟 《对中国英语教育的若干思考》 外语研究2002年第3期
【2】《中国学校外语教学近十多年来的进步》 广东基础教育信息中心 2003年6月20日
【3】《大学英语阅读教学的调查及分析》 《中国大学教学》2004年第1期
【4】曹寅珺 《浅谈英语泛读教学》中国基础教育网。
【5】Christine Nuttall Teaching Reading Skills in A Foreign Language. 2002
（陕西省西北税务学校）