Reading: Adapt or not adapt?
Reading: Adapt or not adapt?
Is it necessary to adjust the language of a text to the level of your students? This question divides language teachers. Some support the idea of adapting vocabulary and grammar in texts to students’ knowledge, others, on the other hand, consider non-adapted authentic texts to be more beneficial.
There are a lot of students who, when stumble upon unknown words in a text, become petrified and unable to continue reading. For these students reading is daunting because it is either too easy and, therefore, not particularly interesting, or they cannot approach a text because it contains unfamiliar vocabulary. As paradoxical as it may sound, what might help these students is authentic texts.
We teach reading because it is a skill that is useful in everyday life. If you think about it, rarely do we come across adapted texts in day-to-day situations. It is not a problem to find such materials when reading for leisure (and, of course, in coursebooks), but it is substantially more difficult when what you seek is information. News, travel brochures, sports results, scientific research, etc. - adapted versions of these are possible to find only in a classroom.
So if not adapting language, how do we make authentic texts more approachable? To every reading task there are two key components: a text itself and tasks which accompany it. Pre-teach a few words which are necessary for understanding, simplify your tasks, adjust the length of your text - there are plenty of steps which can help you in this endeavour. What is more important, however, is that your students will get a feeling of accomplishment. For many of them being able to understand authentic texts is what brings them to the classroom.
You may consider using the following questions when checking a text for difficulty:
- How is the information organised?
- How familiar are the students with the topic?
- Does the text contain redundancy?
- Does it offer visual support, i.e. pictures, videos, infographics, etc. that can aid in reading comprehension?
Authentic materials are a great source of information. There are plenty of them, and with the help of the Internet they are extremely accessible. All of these can aid greatly in catering your lessons to your students needs and aspirations.
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