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Unit 11 introduces the four basic skills present in any language:
Receptive skills: reading and listening.
Productive skills: speaking and writing.
All skills are equally important and every lesson should incorporate all of them as much as possible in order to have a balanced and integrated approach. Unit 11 focus on the receptive skills - reading and listening. There are many reasons and motives to read and listen in any language, and these can be divided in two broad categories:
For a purpose: when we read or listen to achieve a particular goal. For instance, reading the instructions
to learn how to operate a washing machine.
For entertainment: when we read or listen because it is enjoyable and it gives us pleasure. For instance,
listening to someone telling a joke.
To truly read and listen in any language it is not only necessary to use our senses, but we must also use our thinking minds and our pre-existent knowledge of the world to better understand meaning and its corresponding context. To achieve this understanding, several specialist skills can be employed by readers and listeners such as predictive skills, scanning, skimming, detailed information, and deduction from context.
When teaching receptive skills the teacher should be aware of a number of potential problems particular to these skills. On the other hand, the written word and recorded voice allow readers and listeners to go back to the content as many times as they wish, so reading and listening are a good opportunity to expose students to new words and new language structures. As such, a teacher must pay special attention to the selection of texts, topics, and comprehension tasks. These should be challenging, of interest to the students, and should promote understanding and confidence. Pre-teaching vocabulary, predicting what a particular text will be about, and other ‘engage’ activities are recommended as good techniques to help students overcome initial difficulties and become interested and invested in better understanding the provided material.
