The benefits of extensive reading (ER) are well known, yet integrating ER into curricula has been problematic. One factor is the adherence to the principle that students should freely choose what to read, which complicates connecting out-of-class reading with in-class content. Class readers, however, can more easily tie in book content with…

Lessons designed to teach reading and listening typically concentrate on the use of higher-level skills and strategies, such as predicting, scanning, inferencing, understanding text structure, or activating background knowledge. Given that these normal communication skills are already available to students for mother-tongue use, they should…

This article reports on a survey of Swedish EFL teachers' attitudes towards, and dependence on, ELT coursebook packages in the light of recent research into digital literacy. The results showed that while ICT is making massive inroads into language classrooms in technologically advantaged countries like Sweden, the coursebook package still has its…

Recent research in reading comprehension in Western settings has focused on collecting evidence from reading tests that would measure relevant ESL reading constructs to inform reading instruction and assessment. Similar studies in non-Western contexts, however, remain under-reported. This study involved 958 senior secondary Hong Kong (Chinese)…

This article looks at Year 9 (age 13) ESL learners in a secondary school in Hong Kong producing--with minimal input and support from their teachers--their own story books, these being the final task outcome in a series of lessons focusing on creativity. Over a period of two months, as an integral part of their ESL lessons, groups of students…

Introduces the activity of student-written reading logs as a practical application of reader-response theory in English-as-Foreign-Language literature teaching. Because reader-response theory stresses the synthesis between reader and text, it is proposed that practical applications should be based on the interaction. (Author/VWL)

Examination of two "simplified" adaptations of literary texts for less advanced learners of English as a second language found that attempts for lexical and linguistic simplification and linguistic standardization sometimes rendered the texts more difficult to comprehend and resulted in loss of narrative interest. (Author/CB)

Considers the benefits of extensive reading, examines some of the reasons for its failure to take off, describes two programs, and offers teachers some leading questions to help them develop their own programs. (three references) (Author/CK)

This paper describes a project involving EFL learners in synchronous electronic discussions. The output of the students' interactions was analyzed qualitatively to uncover the main linguistic and interactional features. It was observed that the students' discussions contained a large number of spelling, usage, and grammatical errors, an almost…