Components of Reading Abilities 张 Andy

OUTLINE 1. What do you rely on to achieve comprehension? 2. What stand in the way of comprehension? 3. What are components of reading abilities?

Two Excerpts 冻合玉楼寒起粟，光摇银海眩生花。 He was terribly, tragically sad. His family, friends and minister gathered around his bed. They were all deeply sad too. Only his therapist and his accountant remained happy. ( P 65 ) What do you depend on to achieve comprehension?

Difficulties 1. Fish fish fish. 2. Forbidden fruit is sweet. 3. The mirror told me a story. 4. They can fish here. 5. Apart from complementary distribution, a phoneme may sometimes have free variants. 6. He turned on the light. He helped Carla to her feet and took hold of the ghost. (P 71 ) 我是胖人，不是粗人。 狂奔的蜗牛。 令堂可是令尊表姐？ 咬死了猎人的狗。 除了互补分布之外，音位有时可能也有自由变体。

Components 1. Word Recognition 2. Syntactic Parsing 3. Semantic Construction 4. Text Model 5. Situation Model 6. Background Knowledge 7. Working Memory 8. Executive Control

1. Word Recognition  The most fundamental requirement for fluent reading comprehension is and word recognition. Four to five words per second Unconsciously and cannot be suppressed Rapidity and automaticity apply as well to the other 7 processes. automatic rapid

2. Syntactic Parsing  There are things you would love to hear that you would never hear from the person whom you would like to hear them from; but do not be so deaf as not to hear it from the one who says it from his heart. How do you analyze the following sentence?

3. Semantic Construction  A third basic process that starts up automatically as we begin any reading task is the process of combining word meanings and structural information into basic clause-level meaning units.  They can fish here.

4. Text Model  The text model of comprehension is a set of main ideas that the reader develops. It amounts to an internal summary of main ideas.  An example ： Text 13 (P63) An example ： Text 13 (P63)

5. Situation Model  Almost immediately the reader will begin to interpret the information from the text in terms of his or her own goals, feelings and background expectations. This explains the existence of different interpretations of a single text. An example ： The Road Not Taken

5. Situation Model Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same, And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back. I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-- I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. ①③ ②④

6. Background Knowledge  As the reader transforms information from clause-level meaning units to the text model of comprehension and then to the elaborated situation model of reader interpretation, background knowledge takes on the most importance (in inferring). Refer to the previous examples

7. Working Memory  Working memory keeps information active for one or two seconds while it carries out the appropriate processes. If processing of active information is not done quickly enough, the information fades away and must be reactivated, taking more resources and making the reading process inefficient.

8. Executive Control  Text Model and Situation Model construction require the abilities to oversee, or monitor, comprehension, use strategies as needed, reassess and reestablish goals, and repair comprehension problems.