Par

Serge Narri Lubungu

Résumé

Au moment où le monde devient un village planétaire, l’apprentissage de l’Anglais est un défi auquel l’école congolaise est confrontée. Le présent article soutient que la lecture à haute voix demeure une préparation qui facilite le parler courant de l’Anglais, à partir de l’école.

L’auteur appuie son argumentaire par un mécanisme pédagogique, de telle sorte qu’en usant fréquemment cet exercice littéraire, l’enseignant conduise les élèves à la communication interactive. Tel est la pertinence de cet article.  

Introduction

The present piece of writings emphasizes reading aloud as a useful implement which can help pupils, by experimenting it regularly, to cope with speaking skill. Based on an analytical examination of some study cases handled in secondary schools at Pay-Kongila the author opines that reading aloud lessons play an important role in the enhancement of English language learning, paving the way to real communication.

Scope and Focus of the Study

The ultimate aim of English language teaching in our country as stated in the Programme National d’Anglais (1988:29) is to use English as a means of communication. Enabling pupils to fulfill the following skills –understand, speak, read and write both correctly and fluently is the main objective. Learners are expected to speak or communicate within a social group. What an English teacher does in the classroom should aim at fostering his pupils involved in using English communicatively either in or outside the classroom.

Harmer (1983:32) argues that “It is when students are engaged in using language for communication that they are responsible for their own learning: the very practice is communication”. Furthermore, Allright quoted by Harmer clarifies this idea when arguing that “The more a language learner uses language to communicate, the more he integrates his community, expressing clearly his thoughts through the language which is the medium of communication. When using the language, communicants understand and react to each others.

Yet, learners in Congolese schools in general, and within Pay-Kongila schools (even those surrounding Pay) considerably spend a lot of time listening their English teachers ‘performing’ the language rather than being involved to speaking. Teachers become themselves centered actors in the classroom situations! On the contrary, they should ease their teaching so that learners are acquainted with appropriate language use. So, the teacher’s role consists on leading learners to use creatively English.

The Hypothesis of the Work.

Many learners are unable not only to read aloud an English text; they cannot also interpret or paraphrase what they have read. This phenomenon might be explained by lack of accurate strategies on teachers’ behalf or pupils’. That is why we are particularly concerned with the following questions: Do teachers of English apply adequate techniques? What hinder their teaching? Do they reach their goal? Do pupils ‘accept’ English lessons, and attend them effectively?  How can a reading aloud lesson contribute to the real communication in English? Answers to these questions might confirm our main concern. 

Methodology of the Study

We referred to the following methods and technique to reach the aim of our research paper: the documentary and analytical methods on one hand, and the lesson observing on the other. The first method helped us collect printed data from books; the second guided us to get useful details on the way teachers cope with their work. The classroom observation technique helped us look at physical aspects of class activities as well, that is setting conditions including class atmosphere and mood as the later are connected with pupils feedback. 

Division of the Work

To help our readers have a clear understanding of this paper, we divided it into three chapters preceded by a general introduction. The first one deals with some techniques in the English language teaching; the second accounts briefly some lesson attendances at different schools. Within, our readers will also find an analysis of collected data. The third chapter gives techniques and procedures that a well-trained English teacher has to use in order to succeed reading aloud lesson; a way which prepares learners to communicate outside classroom activities. A few words conclude all the work. 

1. Some techniques of english language teaching

Any scientific approach relies on way(s) of realizing something. For a clear understanding of our study, we aim at describing this word technique and at giving some meanings. It helps to understand, as do others the fulfillment of our work. 

1.1. Technique

Such a word cannot be treated in isolation without any link to approach and method. Anthony quoted by Brown (1995:2) argues that: method “is a particular trick, a stratagem or contrivance used to accomplish an immediate objective”.

In language teaching area, a technique is a trick a teacher can use to transmit knowledge to his pupils. It is also a behavioral manifestation of principles, the classroom activity and procedures derived from an application of the principles. Moreover, technique can also be described in terms such as ‘first you do this, then you do that and finally you end this way’. It is how the teacher behaves in the classroom. In doing so in a language teaching process, the teacher makes use of a variety of techniques. Among them we bring out group and pair work, role-play, drills and games. These different techniques can help a language teacher deals with the reading lesson. Naturally, without good techniques lessons must fail. We provide some of strategies within the following lines:

1.2. Group work

Richards et al (1985:127) define group work as a “learning activity which involves a small group of learners working together on a given task”. When speaking of small group, we refer to three or six pupils acting together. Referring to the size group, Harmer (1983:208) suggests that a group of more than nine learners tend to be less active and inappropriate. Participation obviously falls and organization of group itself may start to disintegrate. According to the same author, pupils work together to reach a consensus to avoid a split decision, where decision has to be taken as a result of an activity.

Although it might be uneasy to work together, pupils generally get advantages: group works offer pupils an opportunity to discus, to express freely view-points. While pupils are in groups, they share their experiences and can be involved in keen debate leading to spontaneous communication. From time to time every member tries to participate to the extent that lazy are impelled to work. Likewise, we would better mention the importance of a leader in the work group. The leader of the group has got two functions: the first is that he could act as the group organizer, making sure that the task is superbly done and that the information is also superbly collected or reported. The second role could be to make him a mini-teacher in order to conduct some activities like drills, etc. The teacher must be sure that the pupil chosen as a leader was really primed for his task.

Besides, Harmer (1983:208) assumes that “It may be advantageous to have a student acting as group leader”. This initiates pupils to play a role in a group. Group work not only offers advantage, but also presents inconvenient as stated earlier, that a teacher can be faced to. Again, difficulties one finds in using pair group also apply to group work and solutions will be the same as those for pair work.

1.3. Role-play

Frendo quoted by Anetugow (2015:29) opines that the term role-play is as an activity where the learner takes on a role. “Learners do not play themselves. Normally the learner’s behavior or even opinions are limited to the opinion given on the teacher instruction. In a role-play activity, pupils play a part in a specific situation. They develop the ability to interact with their classmates. In this situation there are no spectators… Role-plays, whether structured or less structured, are important in the communicative approach because they give learners the opportunity to practice communication on in different social contexts and in different social roles”. 

1.4. ProcedureMicrosoft

Encarta defines procedure as established or correct method of doing something.

2. Presentation and lessons analysis

Hereafter we set down some attendances of reading lessons from schools where we roamed to. For the sake of self-confidence, we avoid pointing either at the school or to the teacher(s) who handled concerned lesson(s).

Thus, our approach consists in observing the methodological aspect followed by different teachers in order to make some comments upon these lessons with regard to the objective of taught lessons. Afterwards we intend to give any remedy to improve. Some lessons and their content point out samples strived from schools at Pay city.

Collecting activities took place from February to April 2018.

2.1. Data Collection Analysis

2.1.1. Lessons Presentation

2.1.1.1. Lesson 1: –In the Classroom.

Date: March 3, 2018

Class: 3rd form Sociale

Objective: Pupils will be able to read the text correctly and understand it.

Comments:

Considering his methods and procedures, the teacher looked very vague. His questions did not help pupils to provide any answer as far as they were confused with the general presentation of the lesson. The teacher’s model reading was not stimulating at all! He was stumbling across words. He did not care about rhythm, intonation, or mood. Even the reference is not mentioned.

2.1.1.2. Lesson 2: –Coming to School.

Date: March 10, 2018

Class: 3rd form Commerciale

Objective: I want to make my pupils able to read English themselves.

Comments:

The lack of reference might explain that the lesson could be a pure imagination; its objective does not fit well. The teacher’s preparation appeared good. In fixation and synthesis steps, the teacher asked only hard workers pupils to read, though he did not sufficiently help and guide them. Most pupils were not interested to the lesson; they showed laziness and tiredness. Accordingly, the objective of this lesson does not work unfortunately.

2.1.1.3. Lesson 3: There is a good film on this evening.

Date: April 04, 2018

Class: 4th form Pedagogy

Comments:

The teacher taught this lesson without any preparation sheet, no reference, no objective as well! He did not look after pupils level neither. He led a reading of some kind, with numerous pronunciation, stress, and rhythm mistakes. We assisted to an exhibition of someone demonstrating wrongly his knowledge of English language. What is unsound is the fact pupils imitated mistakes he made within a very long reading text.

2.1.1.4. Lesson 4: –In the Classroom

Date: April 6, 2018

Class: 3rd form Scientific

Objective: I want to make my pupils able to read themselves English correctly.

Comments:

First, one could not imagine such an objective assigned to the present reading lesson. Next, this stands for a lesson that a very weak teacher taught, lacking the reference, as well. Because she could neither read the text nor help the pupils to deal with an understandable reading. Then, several confusions through her speech did not enable learners to let an appropriate feedback: the lesson seemed to be a mixture of a conversation lesson and a reading aloud one. Besides, there was no keen reason to send pupils to read in front of the classroom.

2.1.1.5. Lesson 5: –There’s a good film in this evening.

Date: April 6, 2018

Class: 4th form Sociale

Reference: English for Africa, Pupils book p.6

Objective: At the end of this lesson, pupils will be capable to produce a good reading with a good pronunciation, intonation and stress.

Comments:

Throughout this lesson, there was a link between the recall and the presentation steps. Pupils showed some marks of previous lesson understanding. Yet, the teacher confusingly went on with his teaching: he broke the link between presentation, daily lesson, fixation and controlling steps. Meanwhile he was dealing with both reading comprehension and reading aloud lessons; sometimes, he asked pupils to read silently in order to pick up new words (!)… Again and again, he moved in-between. In brief, the lack of methods and procedures might be the cause of failure to teach accordingly. Of course, even the objective of the lesson could be revised.

2.2. Common Features

The several observations we led on the field show that teachers have not only lack of knowledge but they confused content and steps of lessons also. They had been disappointing in the way they practiced the methodological principles in order to teach their daily lessons. On the other side, pupils seemed weak, in general owed to the fact that ‘English brings new difficulties’ in their learning process. Not only objectives seemed vague, but also most of these lessons lacked references. What disappoints too much is the fact that none of these teachers has got a qualification in English language teaching.

Moreover, reading aloud lesson should not only focus on pronunciation, that is the correct articulation of words, the use of stress, intonation and rhythm (unfortunately badly done!); it could have established links with other skills, such as speaking, however.

So, it would be the teachers’ responsibilities to overcome pupils shortcomings; they could, then engage pupils in some sort of communication; they could have improved pupils abilities by sharing some exercises within small groups (peer/pair groups), and becoming observers to guide the activity given to pupils.

2.2.1. Partial Conclusion

In this chapter, we have evaluated five lessons in third and fourth forms from different secondary schools. Accordingly, we noticed that all the teachers had neither prepared adequately lessons nor taught them appropriately. They got troubles in establishing links between steps of a reading aloud lesson, the content and the sort of the lesson to teach.

So, as states Glenn Deckert: non-trained teachers prove “practical difficulties of implementing a communicative approach when teaching English in English-as-a-foreign language (EFL) settings. These settings are the design and environments in which students have little exposure to English outside the classroom. Some reports attribute the failure of the approach to inadequacies of the teachers themselves. Part of the problem stems from the instructor’s misunderstanding of the very nature of communicative language teaching (CLT). Thus, even when using textbooks designed for communicative activities, teachers tend to revert to traditional teacher-centered routines. (…) Alternatively, excessive teacher talk may simply be the reassertion of old habits that resist change”.

The following chapter is going to signal ways to deal with a Reading Aloud lesson.

3. Suggestive approach for english reading aloud lesson teaching

We give the theoretical aspect of a reading aloud lesson on one side, we try to afford a reconsideration of lessons on section two above on the other side in the following lines, all fed up of a partial conclusion.

3.1. English Language Reading Lesson

Apart from listening, writing and speaking, reading is a skill which brings meaning got from printed or written material to the hearer through the utter’s mouth. That is why, in addition to helping students comprehend the written material in the texts we are using, we should give them the knowledge and the ability to let them read other material out of class and later in their lives with ease and enjoyment. Learners should be able to turn to books freely and with a feeling of pleasure and eventually, perhaps, to read the literature of the foreign country in the original.

Finocchiaro (1973:119-120) keeps up that “reading is a language-related process. Students should be helped to respond to the visual symbols which represent the same auditory signals to which they had responded previously. Listening and speaking should always precede reading. It is only after students can say material with reasonable fluency that they should be permitted to see it… You should always read aloud for the students any material you are going to assign them. Since many languages are not written the way they sound, it is important that you read aloud so that: a) students don’t reinforce incorrect sounds in their silent speech; b) they will comprehend words they meet in their reading which they have heard spoken and vice versa.

In reading, as in listening and speaking, meaning is a composite of pronunciation, grammar, lexicon, and culture. In order to read with comprehension, ease, and enjoyment, students must know all the elements of the sound system of the language, its syntax and structures, and its vocabulary. In addition, they must be familiar with the situation which is under discussion and with any allusion to an aspect of culture.”

Moreover, Finocchiaro go on maintaining that there are principals from which, some remain in connection with the teacher’s responsibilities in developing reading aloud skill: to extend the experiences of the pupils so that they will understand the situations and the cultural allusion on one hand; and to help them increase their speed in reading on the other hand.

The stages in Reading Growth

We have talked about the process of reading. Let us talk now about the stages in the teaching and learning of reading. There are several stages which should be followed wherever possible. We have adapted them from Finocchiaro’s The Foreign Language Learner.

Stage I

Pupils read the material they have learned to say very well or material they may have memorized. This may be a dialogue, a song, a series of action sentences, a quite easy story of experience the class members have had and which they have discussed, model sentences containing some of the structures taught, etc.

In this stage, pupils must be helped to develop increasingly automatic visual responses to the graphic shapes they will see in print. They must be made consciously aware that the written words represent sounds. Thus, the teacher will have the pupils say the known material without looking at it. Then he will read the material aloud as they look at it in their textbooks or workbooks, or on the blackboard. They can read it in chorus after you, the teacher. Next, groups and individuals may be asked to read it.

Besides, individual words or related groups of words from the reading may be placed on flash cards or cue cards at the beginning levels. One learner may be asked to read a card; another one may be asked to match word(s) on the card with those on the board. This is particularly useful when the graphemes are not similar to those of their native tongue.

Stage II

The teacher and/or a group of foreign language teachers in the school or community combine the known words and structures into a different dialogue or paragraph. Pupils are helped to read this newly organized material in which all the elements are familiar to them. 

Stage III

The pupils start to read material in which some of the words and structures are unfamiliar to them. A committee of teachers can write this type of material, or existing material with a low vocabulary and structure level, but at an interest level in harmony with the age of the pupils, may be used. We are brought to argue that learners experiment little or no difficulty when one or two new words are inserted among about twenty familiar ones. Often grammar texts contain paragraphs and selections which are suitable for reading at this level. We would like to mention that the language teacher will find hereafter a detailed technique for teaching reading at stage III.

Stage IV

Some reading specialists recommend the use of simplified literary texts or magazines; though others object to them because the use of simplified texts on the ground does not convey the style or the spirit of the author. Surely, there exist excellent simplified books on the commercial market, however, which can be used to great advantage with pupils who are still not advanced enough to read the originals and who may never, unfortunately, reach the stage of doing so. The technique used to teach this simplified or adapted material will be the same as the one outlined for stage III.

Stage V

We dare say that material herein is unlimited. The whole world of books should be open to pupils. Here again, we would better ask ourselves such a question –when do learners attain the skills required at this stage? Some may never attain them as they would not in their native language. Others may do so after a six-year program in the junior and senior forms of secondary school.

A procedure:

When Stage III reading is introduced, the reading lesson should be done intensively; that is, the pupils’ attention should be drawn to nearly every sound, every grammatical structure, word or cultural fact contained in it. A number of questions should be asked about each utterance in the material. This procedure is outlined under Technique A below. After about a month of intensive reading practice (of course, other language activities and other skills are also developed during this time), the teacher might introduce the procedure for extensive reading (Technique B). When pupils have developed reasonable ability in using both techniques, the teacher might vary the procedures, depending on the difficulty of the material, its interest to the pupils, or the number of pages you are required to cover in one semester.

In the same way, in teaching reading at Stage III and IV, the teacher will find it desirable to:

a.       Divide the reading for that day into two or three sections so that you can vary your techniques and break up the vocabulary load.

b.       Motivate the reading. Relate it to the pupils’ own experiences, or, if the reading is part o a long story, relate it to the longer story by eliciting a summary of the material already read. Follow this by asking a challenging question to interest pupils in the reading and to read them for the part to come.

c.        State the purpose of the reading. e.g. “What do you think will happen?... Let’s find it out,” or “Let’s read more about…”

d.       Come back to any difficulties in the first portion. You may even wish to give a short summary of the reading portion weaving in the words on the board. The difficulties may be in the sounds or sound sequences (elisions, contractions), the structures or syntax, the vocabulary, or the cultural allusions.

e.        Read the passage. After the difficulties have been clarified, you may do several things: You may use Technique A (below) for the three portions of the day’s reading; or you may use Technique B for the three portions; or use ABA or BAB.

Technique A: Read each line aloud in logical normal thought groups. Ask simple question on each line. Make sure the answer is on the printed page so that pupils will feel free to refer to it. At the end of the paragraph, ask for a summary, with several pupils contributing one idea each. If the summary causes problems, ask questions to help elicit the summary. It is essential that the summary be sequential as a preparation for other oral and written activities.

Technique B: Read the entire portion aloud; then ask the pupils to read it silently. (Time the reading.) After they have read, ask them questions; or have them complete sentences which you have placed on the board; or ask them if statements you make are True or False (if they are false, they are to give the true answer); or ask for a summary.

f.        Elicit a complete summary of the day’s reading.

g.       Engage the class in related activities.

-          Distribute four or five sequential questions you have prepared on the reading material. Have one pupil read a question; another answer it orally; another place the answer on the board. When all the answers are on the board, correct any answer with class cooperation and then read the answers. The pupils can read them in chorus after you. The sequential answers will constitute another summary of the material.

-          Read the section, one sentence at a time, and have the class read it in chorus after you.

-          Have the new words used in other appropriate sentences.

-          Do word study drills with your pupils (e.g. ‘Find the synonym of…… in line 4.’ ‘Make a noun from the word …….. in line 5.’ ‘Use the word …….. in a sentence.’ ‘Explain the word ………..’ ‘Give a paraphrase of the expression………..’).

-          Have your pupils formulate questions (inverted or Wh-) the story which they will ask their classmates to answer. Place question words –who, what, when, where, why, how, how much, how long, etc. –on the board or on a chart for easy reference to help them in the formulation.

-          Have them retell the story using the key words you will supply.

-          With books open, have them give the key words in each sentence.

-          Have them give sentences similar to selected ones in the text.

h.       Assign the same reading passage for home. Assign appropriate related oral and written activities like those above or others you will devise. By the way, we afford some notes within the following lines, which are sound to the teaching of reading in general.

-          It is generally unwise to ask pupils whose oral reading is poor to read for the entire class. Neither the pupil nor his classmates will profit from such an oral reading. On the contrary, poor pronunciation may be reinforced or you will have to make numerous corrections. The pupil should be asked to read to you alone at your desk (so that you may help bring him up to class level) at times when the rest of the class is occupied with other meaningful work which you have assigned.

-          Occasionally, but judiciously, you might ask for the translation of one or more expressions or sentences. In general, however, reading and translation should be separate classroom activities

3.2. Reconsideration of lessons 1-5

3.2.1. Introduction

The same lessons –lessons 1, 2 and 5 have been repeated in Social, Business and Pedagogic streams. They only need a common remedy. So, all lessons are reduced to three, instead of five.

We assume that pupils, in general, at this level are curious to hear someone speaking English language, and remain ready to learn as far as they have self-motivation. Their age might help the acquisition of a new language surely.

3.2.2. Improved lessons

3.2.2.1. Lesson 1: –Coming to school.

Date: March 3, 2o16

Class: 3rd form Sociale

Reference: English For Africa, pupils book p. 39

Objective: I will lead my pupils to read the text correctly and understand it.

Lesson teaching and goal:

The teacher announces the title of the lesson after he has recalled the previous one and summarizes the text; this is what leads him to ask the questions below:

T.: How many persons speak in the text?

P1: They are four.

T.: What are their names?

P2: Their names are Bola, Maba, Bosede and Elizabeth.

T.: “Now class, listen carefully my reading”.  The teacher may read twice or three times and choose pupils to read one by one. When pupils are reading, he writes mistakes on the blackboard, which will be corrected at the end of the production step. At the taking-note step, a summary that they have built together is written in pupils’ copybooks.

3.2.2.2. Lesson 2: –In the Classroom.

Reference: English For Africa, pupils book p. 34

Date: March 3, 2018

Class: 3rd form Sociale

Objective: Pupils will be able to read the text correctly understand it.

Lesson teaching and goal:

First, the teacher tells briefly the story after he has announced the subject-matter. Then, s/he models the reading, maybe twice/three times with pupils attention directed to the text, and asks some questions. S/he leads pupils to read aloud, and role-play either within peer pair work or group work. When following pupils activity, s/he dares mention some mistakes on the blackboard, that he will correct then after. S/he sums up with his/her pupils the text that they jot dawn in their copybooks. S/he may recommend pupils to read the text aloud at home, and then bring difficulties next time in the classroom.

3.2.2.3. Lesson 3: There is a good film on this evening.

Reference:

Date: April 04, 2018

Class: 4th form Pedagogy

Reference: English For Africa, pupils book P. 8

Objective: At the end of this lesson, pupils will be capable to produce a good reading with a good pronunciation, intonation and stress and rhythm.

Lesson teaching and goal:

We advise the teacher to follow the procedural thoughts mentioned in one of lessons above. 

Conclusion

The present work has got three chapters: The first has given the meaning of the terms techniques, procedure and role-play in use in the English language teaching; the second has shown the relationship between data collected and their analysis with our brief remedial. The third has afforded our mere suggestions.

Perhaps the most important piece of advice that a trained teacher can give his/her learners is to emphasize extensive reading. S/he has to tell them that we learn to read by reading; this is true for both a first or second language. The more pupils read the better readers they become.

When the teacher encourages his learners to read extensively, he helps them read faster and understand more; he helps them to read in meaningful phrases, rather than word-by-word. At the same time, he increases their confidence in their reading and vocabulary knowledge, as he consolidates grammatical knowledge. Lastly, he helps improve writing proficiency and oral fluency.

So, it is important to realize that the increased fluency, confidence, and motivation that so often result from reading extensively will help learners in their academic efforts, such as preparing journalistic tasks. As it must be confessed that reading is an important skill for English language learners in today’s world; it supports the development of overall proficiency and provides access to crucial information at work and school. With English being the dominant language of the Internet, international business, and academia, beginning and advanced students alike face pressures to develop their second language (L2) reading abilities.

We hope that, Officials in the process of enabling and programming English textbooks, have to take into account Colin Davis thoughts:”Any ESL, EFL, or L2 classroom will be poorer for the lack of an extensive reading program of some kind, and will be unable to promote its pupils’ language development in all aspects as effectively as if such a program were present”.    

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