Text Comprehension Exercises Multiple Choice
READING AS PROCESS
A reader-centered approach is evidenced in reading instruction which focuses, first, on what the reader brings to reading in schematic world knowledge and language knowledge and, second, on their ability and willingness to draw on productive strategies in the course of reading. More traditional reading pedagogy emphasized comprehension in the form of the presentation of text followed by post-reading questions on the text. Process approaches attend, first, to the need to prime the reader with new knowledge or prompt the reader to recover existing knowledge (in advance of reading the text) and, second, to make maximum use of cognitive and linguistic resources during text processing. This involves providing „pre-reading‟ tasks (such as brainstorming, semantic mapping, true-false or agree-disagree tasks), as well as „while-reading‟ tasks (such as margin prompts, encouraging the linking or cross-referencing of one part of a text to another, or encouraging first skim readings followed by closer , more focused ones). Many contemporary coursebooks (e.g. Rossner 1988; Murphy and Cooper 1995) offer a range of such tasks.
A key principle in the design of these tasks is the encouragement of flexible and reflective reading. Flexibility might be promoted by devising tasks encouraging readers to read a range of texts in different ways (e.g. a close detailed reading for some genres and a scanned and later more focused reading for others). Reflective reading, where the reader is engaged with the text, might be encouraged by the interspersion of questions or prompts during the text to encourage interrogation of text. More recent studies of reader strategies (e.g. Janzen and Stoller 1998) invite readers to reflect more specifically on their own reading strategies and to judge the effectiveness of those of other readers.
(WALLACE, C. Reading. In: Carter, R. and Nunan, D. (Eds.) Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages. 2001, Cambridge, CUP.)
Question 1
Mark the statement that expresses the main idea of the text.
[A] How an efficient reader understands a text.
[B] The two different approaches used by modern reading teachers and the tasks they suggest.
[C] The best time to give activities in the reading class: pre, while or post-reading.
[D] The type of tasks used in teaching reading in a process oriented approach.
Questin 2
In the following extract: (…encouraging first skim readings followed by closer, more focused ones), the pronoun ones refers to
[A] readings.
[B] prompts.
[C] tasks.
[D] coursebooks.
Question 3
Considering what the author says about reading as a process, mark T for the true statements and F for the false ones.
( ) In a reader-centered approach, the tasks encourage the students to reflect, thus they become actively involved in the process.
( ) If the students reflect on what they are doing, they probably will feel encouraged.
( ) Process approaches are not suitable for beginners because students must have existing knowledge of the foreign language.
( ) Reader-centered approaches rely heavily on what the student brings to the classroom, both in terms of language (native and foreign) and all other experiences.
Mark the correct sequence.
[A] T, F, F, T
[B] F, F, T, F
[C] T, T, F, T
[D] F, T, T, F
Question 4
Read the following extracts from the text.
More traditional reading pedagogy
and, second, to make maximum use of cognitive and linguistic resources during text processing.
(such as brainstorming, semantic mapping, true-false or agree-disagree tasks)
Mark the alternative that classifies each one respectively.
[A] Conditional sentence, ordinal sentence, comparative expression.
[B] Nominal phrase, enumeration, exemplification.
[C] Superlative comparison, additive sentence, listing of elements.
[D] -ing form as gerund, -ing form as adjective, -ing form as noun.
Answer
1.D 2.A 3.C 4.B
THE TIE-BACK NATURE OF BECOMING LITERATE
For those of us who have come from mainstream homes where we were oriented to composition-centered tasks and academic uses of language from our earliest communicative experiences, the implicit rules of academic language seem natural to us. However, we have learned these rules in a rich context of numerous supporting, reinforcing activities. For most of our students, however, we have to make explicit the academic habits of using oral and written language which the school requires, and we have to provide social interactive meaningful occasions for repeating these habits again and again. Since we cannot know the specific first language socialization of the IndoChinese, Middle Eastern African, or Latin American students in our classes we can solicit from them as much as possible about their first language socialization through asking them to recollect and collect as much as possible.
However, this information will not be sufficient to guide decisions about particular uses of language with which they may be unfamiliar. Thus, ESL/EFL teachers must incorporate into the classroom a variety of types of writing and talking about writing; furthermore the content around which these occasions of talking and writing focus should ideally be familiar. To complicate learning a new language by asking that new content be learned as well, is to make extraordinary cognitive demands on students. Thus we begin with what they know – their own language socialization – and we help them make explicit in their second or foreign language what it is they do know about their oral and written uses of language (see Vann 1981).
(HEATH, S. B. Literacy skills or literate skills? Considerations for ESL/EFL learners. In: Nunan, D. (Ed.)Collaborative language learning. 1992. Glasgow, CUP.)
Question 1
The expression tie-back in the title of the text refers to
[A] the teachers varying oral and written activities and content in the second language classroom.
[B] the lack of academic texts in the social environment of the students in the countries mentioned.
[C] the lack of communicative experiences which the school requires to develop composition-centered tasks.
[D] the students relating to their first language socialization in learning a second language.
Question 2
According to the text
[A] teachers who come from homes where academic language is natural are not able to apply the implicit rule of academic uses of language.
[B] Vann (1981) believes the student must be socialized before he can learn a second or foreign language.
[C] there is a double demand on students: to learn a second or foreign language and to become aware of academic oral and written language.
[D] the oral and written language requested by the academic environment is given previously to students in all contexts.
Answer
1.D 2.C
|Ref.:Ano: 2012 Órg: IF/MT Inst.: UFMT Nível: Superior Docente - Português/Inglês
