International Journal of English and Literature (IJEL) ISSN(P) 2249-6912; ISSN(E) 2249-8028 Vol.

4, Issue 1, Feb 2014, 59-64 TJPRC Pvt. Ltd.

READING AUTHENTIC MATERIAL: EVALUATING LEARNERS PROFICIENCY

SHAILAJA TRIVEDI1 & JAYA TIWARI2
1

Assistant Professor, Disha Institute of Management and Technology, Raipur, Chhatisgarh, India
2

HOD, Girls' Degree College, Pt Ravishankar University, Raipur, Chhatisgarh, India

ABSTRACT
Reading as a receptive skill, leads to knowledge and means different things to diverse people, depending upon the rationales of reading. The needs and objectives of reading are copious and they escort to a mental experience. While reading the objective should be to keep extracting and constructing meaning. Although it is about understanding written texts its thoroughly an active process that improves several stages and processes that act simultaneously to achieve comprehension. Reading, in reality, fulfills our needs to understand and know the world through this wonderful medium, to get information, to gain knowledge, to inspire and motivate ourselves, to convince ourselves, to persuade ourselves, to learn to perform something etc. This paper endeavors to discuss the use of authentic materials in the classroom and appraising the learners, with the learners at an advantage of learning from the exposure to authentic language being used in a factual milieu. Further the facets which prove helpful when utilizing authentic materials is that they are extremely inspiring, giving a sense of accomplishment when understood and eggs on further reading. The learning that takes place in such a classroom isnt a restricted language learning atmosphere; the scholar doesnt come across the synthetic language but the existent world language and how it is actually used. The responsibility of a teacher is not to mislead or hoodwink the learner but to prepare him, giving the knowledge, understanding and compulsory skills so as to appreciate how the language is in reality used.

KEYWORDS: Authentic, Rationales, Copious, Comprehension, Facets, Egg on, Synthetic, Hoodwink INTRODUCTION
Reading is a process that involves our eyes, ears and mind to understand the hidden as well as the literal meanings of words conveyed by the writer. We can read anything at a time we choose to invest. While reading we can come in contact with the minds of millions of wise women and men who have recorded their experiences for our benefit. While reading our objective is to keep extracting and constructing meaning. The process of extracting meaning is called decoding, while the process of expressing what one has said is called encoding. Reading Process Reading is about understanding written texts. It is thoroughly an active process that improves several stages and processes that act simultaneously to achieve comprehension. In between reading and understanding there exists a relationship. Reading is a conscious process while understanding is a subconscious process. Reading views are different for different people. Some think that reading is all about reading newspapers, to some it is reading novels and to other some it is reading the boring textbooks again and again. Not many are fond of reading. People sometimes consider it to be a boring process. But have you ever wondered that this reading process helps us to know the world. Reading, in reality, fulfills most of our needs. The needs could be to understand and know the world through this wonderful medium, to get information, to gain knowledge, to inspire and motivate ourselves, to convince ourselves, to persuade ourselves, to learn to perform something, to enjoy ourselves, or..simply to kill time. The needs and objectives of reading are plentiful and they

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lead to a mental experience. Whatever we read or experience through our senses leads to knowledge. Reading consists of two related process Word Recognition and Comprehension. Word recognition refers to the process of perceiving how written symbols correspond to ones spoken language. Whenever we come across a difficult word in a sentence, we should try to get the meaning of the word either from the earlier sentences or the following ones but shouldnt refer to a dictionary at once. The search for the meaning of the word will help us to identify the part of speech (noun, pronoun, verb, adverb, adjective etc.) of the word and thus we will easily be able to guess the meaning of the word. Comprehension is the process of making sense of words, sentences and connected texts. When we read any piece of information we try to understand The main idea of the passage that is made through a general statement i.e. through the topic sentence. Usually first sentence in the passage conveys us the idea but sometimes the idea gets clear only by the middle or at the end of the paragraph. The main idea by distinguishing it from the supporting details. We should know that sometimes supporting details and examples develop the main idea. These examples and details clarify the idea. What extra information is given about the main idea. This extra information is sometimes very important and at the other times only provides explanation. The details given about the main idea and the relationship that exists between sentences. Any reading that is without comprehension is no reading at all. Some of us read very slow say at the speed of 25 words per minute, some 80-120 wpm, some 150-200 wpm and some even more. Our reading speed varies. But it varies, sometimes, only because of our attitude. We feel that if we read fast well not be able to understand. But this is not so. When we read fast there is no losing on the comprehension. At a steady speed the performance level improves. Comprehension increases. Mind becomes active and acts fast and with this concentration also improves. We should not forget here that during the last days of exams our speed increases. And we leave the hall saying, Thank God, Id read it in the morning. What does this mean? This means that though we read something in a hurry, maybe just once, our brain worked on it and it remembered in time. The digestion took place. So, now we can see it is just our attitude that brings hindrances. What should be our attitude? We should always think that Reading is a simple and easy activity, I can read well and efficiently, I enjoy reading as an active process, According to my personal needs, I just need to vary my speed and method to be an efficient reader. Reading to Gain Knowledge Reading is an indispensable part of language teaching at every stage because it supports learning in many ways. Reading material is language key. By giving students a range of materials to read, teachers provide several opportunities for students to understand vocabulary, grammar, sentence structure, and speech structure as they arise in authentic contexts. Students' rationale for reading in their mother tongue is often to acquire information about a topic they are learning, and this purpose can be helpful in the language learning classroom as well. Reading for substance information in the language classroom gives students both real reading material and a genuine purpose for reading.

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Reading everyday materials that are designed for local learners can give students an insight into the way of life of the nation whose tongue they are learning. When students have an access to newspapers, magazines, and Web sites, they are bare to ethnicity in all its variety, and massive enriching pigeonholes begin to snap.

What is the Focus Presently? Though the pedagogies have changed in the recent years in various institutes, in the state of Chhattisgarh particularly the customary way of teaching language skills is still prevalent. This is a rationale why the students from the institutes are still lagging behind when it concerns to learning a foreign language. The LSRW skills in the schools and colleges are not being fortified but the textbook learning is being promoted. The students learn English as a subject and not a language and thus their prime focus is to pass a certain exam by learning question answers or grammar. The teachers contribution in making the language learning interesting is very little. To enhance the receptive skills, chiefly reading, the focus is on the process of reading rather than on its outcome. They build up students' knowledge of the reading process and reading approaches by soliciting students to reflect and speak about as they do in their mother tongue. They permit students to practice all the reading strategies by means of real reading tasks. They promote students learning by providing them a choice in reading material. During the exercises and practices they usually talk about the strategies that are best suitable for the reading rationale and the kind of content. They also talk about the hows and whys of the strategies. They support the improvement of reading skills and the exercise of reading strategies by using the target language to pass on instructions and subject based information in written form. They do not presume that students will transmit approach use from one task to another. They clearly bring up how a particular approach can be used in a different kind of reading tasks. Use of Authentic Material and Text Any material which has not been specifically produced for the purpose of language teaching is authentic. (Nunan (1989): as cited in Macdonald, Badger &White, 2000) Authentic materials are texts produced by native speakers for a non-pedagogical purpose. Bacon & Finnemann (1990) Use of authentic material renders the learner to a much authentic language even if the classroom is not a real-life location. Authentic materials furthermore give the reader the chance to gain existent information and discern what is happening in the world around them. They also fabricate a sense of achievement. Mining factual information from a genuine text in a foreign language can be exceptionally encouraging, so a teacher should try to increase students' enthusiasm for learning by exposing them to 'real' language (Guariento & Morley 2001). Wallace, 1992, has defined Authentic texts as real-life texts, not written for pedagogic purposes.According to Peacock, 1997 materials that have been produced to fulfill some social purpose in the language community. The language in non-authentic texts is synthetic and indifferent, focusing on something that has to be taught and often contains a series of fake-text indicators that consists of rightly produced sentences (always); a subject using a grammatical structure, gets a complete answer; recurrence of structures; and many a times does not read well.

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As soon as texts, whatever their original purpose, are brought into classrooms for pedagogic purposes they have, arguably, lost authenticity. (Wallace 1992:79) Authentic texts can be motivating because they are proof that the language is used for real -life purposes by real people. (Nuttall 1996:172) Teachers should put deliberate efforts to develop communicative competence of students by giving real-life reading tasks that engage meaningful communication. It must therefore be authentic: It must be such a material that students will require and desire to read when traveling, or using the language in other situations outside the classroom. While giving assignments it should be kept in mind that the complexity of a reading text is less a role of the language, and more a role of the theoretical trouble. Making a text simpler by varying the language often removes usual redundancy and makes the structure fairly difficult for students to expect. Rather than making a text easier by changing its language, make it more accessible by eliciting students' present understanding in a pre-reading talk, appraising new vocabulary before reading, and asking students to carry out tasks that are within their capability, such as skimming to get the main idea or scanning for specific information, before they begin intensive reading. Students must be reading for purposes that make meaning and have application to them. It shouldnt be for the sake of completing homework or an assignment. Teacher should know how students plan to apply the language they are learning and what topics they are fascinated in reading. Give them chance to select their reading coursework, and persuade them to use the library, the Internet, and foreign language bookstores to get other things they would like to read. Students should comprehend the content in a way that goes well with the reading reason, the kind of text, and the approach with which people usually read. It should be taken care that reading aloud occurs only outside the classroom, where it is by and large reading for pleasure. The mainstream of students' reading should be done noiselessly and the approach must be genuine. Important Factors in Choosing Authentic Reading Material The broad range of various types of text means that it is simpler to sustain students interest and that they may be encouraged to read further for pleasure. A benefit of taking authentic material into the classroom is that students can in fact pick what they wish to read. The more the students read, the better they will become, not only in language level but also in self-confidence. The language teacher has to be cautious enough while selecting the content. She should see if the text interests the student or not? Whether it fulfills students needs? Will the material give the student real-life learning or not? (The teacher may provide them a railway timetable, a menu card or a brochure etc). The content should be usable for teaching purposes. The purpose and strategies should be clear and the objective to enhance the reading skills of the students should be thoroughly studied. The level of text, language used, complex nature, relevance and vocabulary content should be keenly analyzed. The students find the reading sessions very boring so it should always be kept in mind whether the material looks authentic, attractive, attention-grabbing or not. The material should induce the students to read and invigorate them. How Authentic Material Can Enhance Reading Skills? The use of authentic materials is a significant function of Communicative Language Teaching. In existent world we read because we are concerned in the unrestrained idea of the content, in the thoughts that the author has articulated or

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the outcome that the text is believed to generate on the reader. The language in an authentic text is diverse, while in a non-authentic one there is often one distinct construction that is frequent. The use of rightly genuine texts is an imperative means of teaching students to communicate efficiently. Variety of authentic materials can be used in the CLT classrooms, but the most common are readily available product wrappers, pamphlets, hoardings, banners, posters, newspapers, magazines, TV programs, movies, songs and literature. One of the very valuable sources is the Internet. While newspapers and any other written matter date very quickly, the Internet is constantly updated, more attractive, visually thought-provoking as well as interactive, therefore supporting a livelier stratagem to reading than a flaccid one. Ive observed that the use of authentic material in CLT classrooms not just strengthens the teacher-learner relationship but also motivates and gives confidence to the learner to learn the target language, making the classroom atmosphere buoyant and the students proactive. This also has a constructive consequence on learner impetus as they provide them real language exposure. The material supports a more creative approach to teaching by taking the students and the teacher out of the hackneyed boundaries of curriculum. It also offers a wide variety of text types, language styles not easily found in conventional teaching materials and relates to learners needs a nd interests. Unlike customary teaching materials, genuine materials are incessantly modernized, restructured and simplified leading to an optimistic result on intellectual capacity, understanding and learner contentment.

CONCLUSIONS
When authentic materials are used in CLT classroom the students get a benefit of the exposure to an existent language being used in an actual milieu. Authentic texts are supplements to textbook reading materials and they prepare students for real life reading at large, making them market-ready. The responsibility of the teacher is not to mislead the language learner but to train him, giving the knowledge; understanding and fundamental skills so as to comprehend how the language is in actuality used. Authentic texts cultivate the progress of their reading skills thus serving them expand their self-confidence in their reading skill in the foreign language. They become self-sufficient readers, who can take conscientiousness for their own reading.

REFERENCES
1. 2. 3. 4. Bonesteel, L. (2011). Real Reading1. New York: Pearson Longman. Bonesteel, L. (2011). Real Reading 3. New York: Pearson Longman. Dickinson, Leslie. Self-instruction in Language Learning.Cambridge University Press, 1988. Hu, M., & Nation, I. S. P. (2000).Vocabulary density and reading comprehension.Reading in a Foreign Language, 13(1), 403-430. 5. Nation, I. S. P. (2006).How large a vocabulary is needed for reading and listening? Canadian Modern Language Review, 63(1), 59-82. 6. 7. 8. Nation, I. S. P. (2007).The four strands. Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching, 1(1), 1-12. Savage, A., & Wiese, D. (2011).Real Reading 4. New York: Pearson Longman. Widdowson, H. G. (1976). The authenticity of language data. In J. F. Fanselow& R. Crymes (Eds.), On TESOL 76 (pp. 261-270). Washington, D.C.: TESOL.

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9.

Wiese, D. (2011). Real Reading 2. New York: Pearson Longman.