Reading in a Foreign Language: Research and Pedagogy

This article, which originated as the author's plenary address to the
1989 JALT Conference in Okayama, Japan, surveys recent research
in second or foreign language reading, especially that research
conducted within the context of schema theory, and discusses the
implications and applications ofthat research to classroom reading
pedagogy. After an introduction to schema theory and its conceptualization
ofthe reading process as an interaction of text-based and
reader-based processes, the author discusses schema-theoretic
readingresearchfirstfrom the perspective of content schemata, and
then formal schemata, and then the interaction of the two types of
schemata. Within each type of schemata, effects studies (showing
the effects on second or foreign language reading comprehension of
content and formal schemata) as well as training studies (showing
the facilitation of second or foreign language reading by training the
appropriate content and formal schemata) are reviewed. The author
covers her own research, as well as that of others.
The second part of the article discusses the teaching implications
and applications of the research to second or foreign language
reading classrooms. Prereading activities, semantic mapping, "namebrand"
reading methods, dialogue journals, the reading laboratory
approach, content-centered approaches, text-mapping, and rhetorical
approaches to reading are discussed.