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Pr ocedures

that

promote

learning

Text talk

One

of

the matn thtngs

students

have to

learn

is how

to interrogate texts: how to

continually

stop

and

ask

yourself

questions

like

'Now,

what does the

writer

mean

by

saying

that?'or

'I

don't understand

this word:

does

it matter?' or

'When

6he

refers to

the

prevlous

meeting ,

what meeting

is she

talking

about?'

In

the

early

days,

you

may

like to

talk through

some

texts

in

this way with the

class,

thinking

aloud

about

the

questions

the text

raises.

(There

are examples

of

this later in

the

book.)

Many

students

will

have

had

no experience ofreading

as

an active

process,

so

it is helpful

for

them

to

see

what

interrogating

a

text looks

like.

In addition,

you

will

want

to devise

plenty

of

activities

that

focus

attention

on

the

text,

especially

on

bits

of

the text

that

are

important

anil

possibly

problematic.

(I

urge

you

not to

focus

on

problems

that don't matter, but

teach

students

to ignore them.)

We

shall

be

giving

a lot

of

attention

(especially

in Part Two)

to

the

kinds

of

things

that

can

give

rise

to

mlsunderstanding in texts

-

the

kinds

of

things a reader should

treat

as

warning

signals.

I

hope this

rvill

help

you

to recogaize

potential

problems,

so

that

you

in

turn

can

alert students

to

them, until they

are able to

do

it

for

themselves.

Classroom atmosphere

One

habit

you

may have

to

break

is

asking

'Do

you

understand?'

and

believing

people

when

they reply 'Yes'.

Try

to thtnk of

other

ways to chgck

understanding, such

as

asking

a

question

which

they cannot answer

unless

they

do

understand. Or

at

least

ask

for

an

explanation.

However,

the

students

will

soon

learn

to

admit

that

they

don't understand, when

they

see

that

you

don't consider

this

anything

to

be

ashamed of

(in

fact,

to

admit

it

is

positively

admirable), especially

ifyou succeed

in creating

a

supportive,

non-

judgemental

and

constructive

atmosphere. This

is

done

by

expeeting

people

to

have a

go,

not

criticizing

them

ifthey

do

not

fully suceeed,

and

accepting

frequent

not-fully-

successful

attempts

as the

normal

price

to

be

paid

for

learning.

Your

attitude

to

students

who are unsuccessflrl

needs

to

reflect a

spirit of

common

endeavour,

not

assessment.

Matter-of-fact

and

gentle

recognition of error

achieves

more

than

criticism

or

condemnation,

and

the

sooner

the

students follow

your

example in

their

attitude

to

one another,

the

sooner

real learning

will

begin. We

all learn from

one

another's attempts,

and

welearn morefrom

those

which

are

imperfect, becausethat

is

where

you

can use

scaffolding

to

push

the

students towards their

'next

step'level.

Learner

tratning

Much

of

what

I

have

suggested

you

do

in

the

classroom

can

be

summed

up

as

Iearner

rralning:

a

conscious attempt

on

your part

to

equip

the

students

to

make

a

conscious

attempt on

their

part

to

find

out

what helps

them

to read

better,

so

that

they

can

adopt

successful

strategies for tackling

texts.

Obviously this

should

staft

as

soon as

possible.

It takes

time

(patience

and

tenacity

are

useful

qualities

for

a

teacher),

but

it

works,

provided you

adopt

the kinds ofclassroom

procedure

described

above

and

elsewhere in the book, and

provided

you

make sure

that the students always

understand

the

point

ofwhat they

are

doing. Many

students

have

never taken charge

of

their

own

learning, nor

experienced

critical thinking

before.

They

flnd it

difftcult

at flrst,

but

liberating

and

powerful

once

they

have

learnt

how

to do it; and

you

may

be

rewarded

by seeing

them develop

remarkably.

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