1. An Interactive Approach to Teaching L2 Reading: From the Bottom-Up
Heidi Hyte
Brigham Young University

2. Webinar Objectives
Provide examples of bottom-up, top-down, and interactive strategies for teaching L2 reading.
Provide practical methodology and approaches to teaching bottom-up strategies in L2 reading.
Offer rationale for the role of students’ phonemic awareness.
Offer rationale for the use of explicit, systematic bottom-up strategies instruction.

3. The ability to successfully generate meaning from text.
What is reading?
The ability to successfully generate meaning from text.

4. What is fluent reading?

5. What is fluent reading?
“The ability to read at an appropriate rate with adequate comprehension” (68).
Anderson, N. J. (2003). Exploring Skills: Reading. In D. Nunan (Ed.), Practical English Language Teaching (pp ). New York: McGraw-Hill.

6. What is strategic reading?

7. What is strategic reading?
“The ability of the reader to use a wide variety of reading strategies to accomplish a purpose for reading” (68).
Anderson, N. J. (2003). Exploring Skills: Reading. In D. Nunan (Ed.), Practical English Language Teaching (pp ). New York: McGraw-Hill.

8. What is the goal of reading?
Comprehension

9. Factors that influence reading comprehension:

10. Factors that influence reading comprehension:
The reader
The text
Interaction between the reader and the text:
Strategies
Schema
Purpose for reading
Manner of reading
Fluency
Aebersold, J. & Field, M. L., (1997). From reader to reading teacher: Issues and strategies for second language classrooms. New York: Cambridge University Press.

11. Models of Reading Bottom-up processing (decoding) Top-down processing
Interactive approach

12. Bottom-up Processing
Reader builds meaning from the smallest units of meaning to achieve comprehension.
Example
letters  letter clusters  words  phrases  sentences  longer text  meaning = comprehension

13. Top-down Processing
Reader generates meaning by employing background knowledge, expectations, assumptions, and questions, and reads to confirm these expectations.
Example
Pre-reading activities (i.e. activating schema, previewing, and predicting) + background knowledge (cultural, linguistic, syntactic, and historical) = comprehension
Aebersold, J. & Field, M. L., (1997). From reader to reading teacher: Issues and strategies for second language classrooms. New York: Cambridge University Press.

14. Interactive Approach
Reader uses both bottom-up and top-down strategies simultaneously or alternately to comprehend the text.
Example
Reader uses top-down strategies until he/she encounters an unfamiliar word, then employs decoding skills to achieve comprehension.
Aebersold, J. & Field, M. L., (1997). From reader to reading teacher: Issues and strategies for second language classrooms. New York: Cambridge University Press.

15. Interactive Approach
Knowledge base + bottom-up strategies + top-down strategies = comprehension

16. Which model should be adopted?
The reader must be competent in both bottom-up and
top-down processing.
Nunes, T. (1999). Learning to read: An integrated view from research and practice. Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Kluwer.

17. Interaction (“balance”) of bottom-up and top-down strategies:

18. Interaction (“balance”) of bottom-up and top-down strategies:

19. Interaction (“balance”) of bottom-up and top-down strategies:

20. Interaction (“balance”) of bottom-up and top-down strategies:

21. Interaction (“balance”) of bottom-up and top-down strategies:
Bottom-up strategies
(“phonics”
approach)
________________
Examples:
decoding
using capitalization to infer proper nouns
graded reader approach
pattern recognition
Top-down strategies
(“whole language”
approach)
________________
Examples:
using background knowledge
predicting
guessing the meaning of unknown words from context
skimming/scanning
Bottom-up
Top-down

22. Models of Reading: Application
Top-down processing
The kenlig coddlers canly kimpled in the cumpy kebs.
1) What kind of coddlers were they?
2) What did the coddlers do?
3) How did they do it?
4) Where did they do it?
5) In what kind of kebs did they kimple?
6) What is the subject? What is the verb?

23. Models of Reading: Application
Bottom-up processing
The kenlig coddlers canly kimpled in the cumpy kebs.
When do you spell words with a C or a K?
kenlig
coddlers
canly
kimpled
cumpy
kebs

24. Decoding Strategy: The C and K Skill
C – a, o, u K – i, e
cat kid
cob Ken
cup kin
can keg

25. Models of Reading: Application
Bottom-up processing
The kenlig coddlers canly kimpled in the cumpy kebs.
When do you spell words with a C or a K?
kenlig
coddlers
canly
kimpled
cumpy
kebs

26. Top-down Strategies: Application
Step 1: Read the title. Predict what the text is going to be about.
Step 2: Ask questions:
- What is your purpose for reading this text?
- What type of text is this? (A newspaper article? A letter? A textbook? A poem?)
- What is a “Jabberwocky”?
Step 3: Activate background knowledge: What do you know about Lewis Carroll’s style of writing?

27. Top-down Strategies: Application
“Jabberwocky”
By Lewis Carroll
(from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, 1872)

28. Top-down Strategies: Application
“Jabberwocky”
By Lewis Carroll
(from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, 1872)
`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves   Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: All mimsy were the borogoves,   And the mome raths outgrabe.

29. Top-down Strategies: Application
Which top-down strategies did you use while reading to help you comprehend the text?
Were your top-down strategies enough to read the text?
What did you do when you came across an unfamiliar word?

30. Bottom-up Strategies: Application
How do you read these words?
wabe
brillig

31. Bottom-up (Decoding) Strategies:
Framework of Phonics:
42 sounds
5 phonetic skills
2 decoding skills

32. Press space bar three times until all the marks are put on the word
Five Phonetic Skills *
1. met X
The letters that come right after the first vowel in the word will indicate what the vowel will sound like. A new term is given to consonants as we look at phonetic skills #1 and #2. These letters are called consonant/guardians. The 1st phonetic skill is: “The vowel is short because it has a guardian (or consonant) after it.”
Press space bar three times until all the marks are put on the word

33. Press the space bar four time to mark the word
Five Phonetic Skills * *
2. jump X
Words that follow the 2nd phonetic skill will have two consonant guardians that follow the vowel. The skill says: “The vowel is short because it has two guardians after it.”
Press the space bar four time to mark the word

34. Press space bar once to mark the word
Five Phonetic Skills
3. me X
In the 3rd phonetic skill there will be no consonant/guardians that follow the vowel. Phonetic skill #3 says that the vowel will be long because it stands alone as in the words he, she, we, and me.
Press space bar once to mark the word

35. Press space bar twice to mark rest of word.
Five Phonetic Skills
4. smile X X
In phonetic skill number 4, there are going to be two vowels. The E is silent which makes the first vowel long. This is called silent E rule. The rule says: “E is silent making the first vowel long.”
As you can see, some of the word is already marked. You see two vowels and both of them are marked with an ‘x’. Watch as we mark the rest of the word.
Press space bar twice to mark rest of word.

36. Press space bar twice to mark the word
Five Phonetic Skills
5. boat X X
The last phonetic skill also has two vowels, but they are standing together. The fifth phonetic skills says that the second vowel will be silent which makes the first vowel long. This is also known as the adjacent vowel rule.
Press space bar twice to mark the word
[It may be beneficial to show an example of the computer presentation at this point. You would use Lesson 17 to illustrate how the computer teaches the fifth phonetic skill, adjacent vowels. It will require you to set up your system so a student is at Lesson 17 are quickly available so you do not lose continuity in the presentation.]

37. Five Phonetic Skills 1. met 2. jump 3. me 4. smile 5. boat * * * X X X

38. Five Phonetic Skills
How do you decode this word?
wabe

39. wabe Five Phonetic Skills How do you decode this word? X X
Let’s go back to the Jabberwocky” poem. How do you decode this word using one of the 5 phonetic skils?
Now to decode the next word, we need to look at the 2 decoding skills…

40. Decoding Skill #1
motel
We have been working with one-syllable words up until now. We have not learned how to handle larger words, like motel, because it has two vowels. It does not fit the rules of our phonetic skills as it stands.

41. 1. mo 3. mote 2. mot 4. motel Decoding Skill #1 * X X X X X X
Here is how we decode the word motel. This is an example of decoding skill #1. If we look at the first two letters alone, we read mo. If we were to mark it, it would follow phonetic skill #3.
Press space bar
When we add the T we have mot, which means “a cynical remark”, and it now follows phonetic skill #1.
If you add an E on the end you get mote, which follows phonetic skill #4.
But as soon as we add the L we have two working vowels. This causes the word to have two syllables in the word. X X X

42. motel Decoding Skill #1 One consonant (guardian) goes on X X
After we mark the vowels…
Press space bar two times
…the first decoding skill teaches us that the syllable break will be located as you look at the first vowel. If there is only one consonant before the next vowel, it must go on to the next syllable.
Then you apply the 3rd phonetic skill to the first syllable (mo)
Press space bar
and the 1st phonetic skill to the second syllable (tel).
Press space bar to finish marking word
The word is mo-tel, motel.
One consonant (guardian) goes on

43. Press space bar to mark the word
Decoding Skill #1
provide X X X
Follow me as I demonstrate the marking sequence for this word using the first decoding skill.
Press space bar to mark the word
One consonant (guardian) goes on

44. campus Decoding Skill #2 Two consonants (guardians) split X X
The second decoding skill says that if there are two consonants following the first vowel they will split.
Press space bar two times
The M stays with the first syllable…
…and the second syllable gets the P.
Press space bar three times
The word is cam-pus, campus.
Two consonants (guardians) split

45. Decoding Skill #2
How do you decode this word?
brillig

46. Decoding Skill #2
How do you decode this word?
brillig X X

47. Bottom-up Strategies: Application
How do you read these words?
wabe
brillig

48. The role of phonemic awareness
What is phonemic awareness?
The consciousness that words are composed of separate sounds
The strategies used to:
Segment strings of sounds
Discriminate between these sounds

49. The role of phonemic awareness
Why is it important for
ESL/EFL readers?

50. The role of phonemic awareness
Why is it important for
ESL/EFL readers?
“ESL and EFL learners need to acquire the knowledge base of English phonemes so that their aural discrimination of sounds can proceed effortlessly, quickly, and unconsciously” (53).
Birch, Barbara M.  (2002).  English L2 Reading:  Getting to the Bottom.  New Jersey:  Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers.

51. The role of phonemic awareness
Why is it important for
ESL/EFL readers?
“Phonemic awareness is an important precursor for alphabetic reading, but paradoxically people often acquire it as a result of learning to read an alphabet” (54).
Birch, Barbara M.  (2002).  English L2 Reading:  Getting to the Bottom.  New Jersey:  Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers.

52. The role of phonemic awareness
Why is it important for ESL/EFL readers?
Readers who have it are better readers.
Readers are able to connect sounds with symbols.
Readers can attach meaning to sounds.
If readers can associate the sounds of words when learning the meaning of new vocabulary, it sticks better.

53. Application: Now What?
1) First provide explicit instruction in bottom-up/decoding strategies, then allow opportunities to practice bottom-up strategies in extensive reading materials.

54. Application: Now What?
2) Use shorter passages to teach intensive reading skills and longer texts to apply top-down strategies.

55. Application: Now What?
3) Select materials for both intensive (teaching explicit strategies) and extensive (application of strategies) purposes. One single text generally cannot meet both needs.

56. Application: Now What?
4) When teaching new vocabulary, provide explicit decoding strategies to enable learners to develop phonemic awareness.
- rhyming games (mat  pat)
- manipulation of beginning, middle, and end of words (mat  pat  pet  pen)

57. Self Reflection
Take a moment to ponder the answers to the questions on the following slide. As you answer these questions, think of your students’ needs. What kind of strategies do you need to equip your students with in order to help them achieve the goal of comprehension?

58. Self Reflection
1) What strategies do YOU use to teach reading?

59. Self Reflection 1) What strategies do YOU use to teach reading?
2) When you learned how to read, did you learn both bottom-up and top-down skills?

60. Self Reflection 1) What strategies do YOU use to teach reading?
2) When you learned how to read, did you learn both bottom-up and top-down skills?
3) When you teach reading, do you rely more on teaching top-down strategies? If so, why?

61. Self Reflection 1) What strategies do YOU use to teach reading?
2) When you learned how to read, did you learn both bottom-up and top-down skills?
3) When you teach reading, do you rely more on teaching top-down strategies? If so, why?
4) Are you an interactive reading teacher?

62. Why bottom-up?
“Despite the emergence of interactive models, I am concerned that much of the second language reading literature continues to exhibit a strongly top-down bias… This research has resulted in many useful insights, but the lack of attention to decoding problems has, I think, produced a somewhat distorted picture of the true range of problems second language readers face” (95).
ESL/EFL teachers are really good at teaching students top-down strategies, i.e. activating background knowledge (schema), skimming, scanning, etc., but bottom-up skills are neglected. Why? Is it perhaps because we’re not as confident in our ability to instruct students in bottom-up skills? Teachers probably naturally lean to top-down skills if they do not know enough about phonics.
Many ESL/EFL learners over-rely on top-down skills because they have not been equipped with bottom-up/decoding skills—especially poor readers.
Eskey, D. (1993). Holding in the bottom: An interactive approach to the language problems of second language readers. In P. Carrell, J. Devine, & D. Eskey (Eds.), Interactive approaches to second language reading (pp ). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.

63. Why bottom-up?
“In practical terms, my concern is thus to keep the language in the teaching of second language reading. That may not sound very controversial, but I think that in promoting higher-level strategies--like predicting from context or the use of schemata and other kinds of background knowledge--some researchers have been sending a message to teachers that the teaching of reading to second language readers is mostly just a mater of providing them with the right background knowledge for any texts they must read, and encouraging them to make full use of that knowledge in decoding those texts. Though that is certainly important, it is also, I think, potentially misleading as a total approach…We must not, I believe, lose sight of the fact that language is a major problem in second language reading, and that even educated guessing at meaning is not a substitute for accurate decoding” (97).
Barbara Birch reinforced this when she stated that predicting or skimming strategies may work when reading for pleasure, but they will not do when reading to comprehend journal articles and difficult textbooks (Birch, p. 61).
Eskey, D. (1993). Holding in the bottom: An interactive approach to the language problems of second language readers. In P. Carrell, J. Devine, & D. Eskey (Eds.), Interactive approaches to second language reading (pp ). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.

64. What’s your opinion?
“[The introduction of top-down processing] has had such a profound impact [on second language reading] that there has been a tendency to view the introduction of a strong top-down processing perspective as a substitute for the bottom-up, decoding view of reading, rather than its complement” (3-4).
Carrell, P. (1993). Introduction: Interactive approaches to second language reading. In P. Carrell, J. Devine, & D. Eskey (Eds.), Interactive approaches to second language reading (pp. 1-7). Cambridge, England: ambridge University Press.

65. Sources
Aebersold, J. & Field, M. L., (1997). From reader to reading teacher: Issues and strategies for second language classrooms. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Anderson, N. J. (2003). Exploring Skills: Reading. In D. Nunan (Ed.), Practical English Language Teaching (pp ). New York: McGraw-Hill.
Birch, B. M, (2002). English L2 Reading: Getting to the Bottom. Mahwah, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Carrell, P. (1993). Introduction: Interactive approaches to second language reading. In P. Carrell, J. Devine, & D. Eskey (Eds.), Interactive approaches to second language reading (pp. 1-7). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.
Eskey, D. (1993). Holding in the bottom: An interactive approach to the language problems of second language readers. In P. Carrell, J. Devine, & D. Eskey (Eds.), Interactive approaches to second language reading (pp ). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.
Nunes, T. (1999). Learning to read: An integrated view from research and practice. Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Kluwer.