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PURPOSIVE READING
Purposeful reading allows you to harness the power of focused and intentional reading,
helping you to grasp new vocabulary faster and unlock deeper comprehension of
complex texts. Whether you're a beginner or advancing in your linguistic journey,
purposeful reading is the key to accelerating your progress, enhancing retention,
and truly immersing yourself in a new language.
READING DEFINED (ROMERO & ROMERO, 1985)

 Reading is decoding written symbols.

 Reading is getting meaning from printed page.
 Reading is putting meaning into the printed page.
 Reading is the process of interpreting the written symbols.
 Reading is the process of communication between author and reader

IMPORTANCE OF READING
1. Reading is good for your brain. According to Joseph Addison, “Reading is to the
mind what exercise is to the body.” Scientific studies show that reading does make you
smarter. Reading a novel, for example, increases the blood flow and improves
connectivity in the brain.
2. Reading introduces you to new ideas and invites you to solve problems. Your
analytical thinking was stimulated merely from reading. Reading helps you detect
patterns, solve problems, and assimilate new information as if you were living in the
characters’ shoes.
3. Reading makes you a better writer. When you read, your brain absorbs good
writing techniques and vocabulary. In your own writing, you will unconsciously copy the
writing styles of books that held your attention. Reading also enhances your vocabulary
and spelling. New words appear in their natural context and you can deduce meaning
from the surrounding words, while visually imprinting their spelling for accurate recall.
4. Reading improves your conversational skills. Because reading increases your
vocabulary and your knowledge of how to correctly use new words, reading helps you
clearly articulate what you want to say. The knowledge you gain from reading also gives
you lots to talk about with others.
5. Reading strengthens worldview and convictions. When you read a book with a
concurring worldview, it reinforces your convictions. If you read a book with an opposing
worldview, it broadens your perspective and causes you to examine your beliefs and
search for truth.
6. Reading improves your self-discipline and consistency.
With the modern barrage of media and instant technological information, our attention spans are getting shorter and
shorter. Reading a book, unlike skimming a web page, forces you to focus. To get the most out of a story, you must
fixate on the plot and complete the book. In doing this, your brain forms deep connections and practices
concentration.
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IMPORTANCE OF READING continuation..

7. Reading increases your knowledge of history. Reading can teach you historical
politics, customs, cultures, economics, and intellect. Often these facts are set in a
context of a story, making history easy to remember.
8. Reading increases cultural knowledge. Reading books set in cultures different
from our own provides knowledge of those cultures and the emotional and spiritual lives
of the people who live there.
9. Reading challenges your imagination. As you read, you put yourself in the
characters’ shoes. Your brain goes beyond the words on the page, imagining details
such as appearances, emotions, and surroundings.
William Styron wrote, “A great book should leave you with many experiences, and
slightly exhausted at the end. You live several lives while reading.”
10. Reading increases your skill in an area of interest. Reading about your specific
field or interests can improve your success in your field. You will gain factual knowledge
and learn from others’ experiments and mistakes.
11. Reading inspires you. Reading a good book is like being around an inspiring
person. You observe inspiring actions, feel contagious passion, and desire to live a
better life.
12. Reading reduces stress. Reading about something you enjoy or losing yourself in
a good novel is an excellent way to relax. It can ease tension in your muscles and heart
while letting your brain wander to new ideas and live in someone else’s shoes. Reading
is a mini vacation for your brain
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CHARACTERISTICS OF THE READING PROCESS

1. Reading is a complex process. Reading is a complex process because there are
many factors involved that may affect one’s performance in reading. Word recognition,
identifying and making sense out of the words being read are also a few of the
requisites towards better comprehension of the text.
2. Reading is a two-way process.
Reading is not just receiving or absorption of ideas; it is an interaction or communication
between the author and the reader. When the reader fails to understand the text, he
may have a problem of poor comprehension, thus communication gap between him and
the author occurs. The reading act is complete only when the reading is put to use in
some way, like communicating with others in discussion, reporting, summarizing,
etc.
3. Reading is largely a visual process. For one to be able to read well, he has to have
good eyesight.
4. Reading is an active process. The reader constructs meaning from a text and may
have different interpretation of what he reads because of his experiences and
knowledge. As a reader reads, he asks questions and looks for points to which he
agrees or disagrees
5. Reading makes use of a linguistic system which enables readers to be more
effective users of written language. A reader would do better if he knows the syntax,
orthography, and morphology of a language. Having said this, he could interact more
effectively with the printed page.
6. Effective reading is partly dependent on the reader’s prior knowledge or
background experiences. A person’s knowledge of the topic facilitates
comprehension.
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READING TECHNIQUES
1. Scanning. This is a reading strategy that is used for getting some specific points by looking at the
whole text. Scanning trains students to think of clues in finding specific information and to move their
eyes rapidly to obtain the information quickly using clues like word/words, alphabetical order,
numbers, etc. When you do the following, you do scanning technique.
a. Looking up the meaning of a word in a dictionary.
b. Finding a telephone number in a directory.
c. Finding statistical information in tables, charts, and graphs.
d. Finding the answers to certain questions from a text.
e. Looking up a name from the telephone guidebook

Procedures for scanning:

a. Keep in mind only the specific information to be located.

b. Decide which clues will help to find the required information.
c. Move your eyes as quickly as possible down the page to find the clue.
d. Read the section containing the clues to get the information needed
2. Skimming. This reading technique is used for looking for main ideas in a text, without going into the
details. Under this technique, we read quickly to get the main points and skip over the detail. When
skimming, try to do the following:

a. Do not read everything.

b. read the first and last sentences of the paragraph.

c. Read the introduction and the summary.

d. Read a few examples until you understand the concept they want to illustrate

3. Comprehensive Reading

When undertaking comprehensive reading, your aim must be clear in mind. Student must read carefully
and slowly in order to get information and understand the text

The following are necessary to do comprehensive reading:

a. Vocabulary recognition
b. Sentence comprehension
c. Paragraph analysis
d. Interpreting illustrations
To be able to read critically, the student must learn to:
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a. Examine the reliability of the material.

b. Distinguish facts from opinions.

c. Draw inferences from the material

READING PURPOSES IN THE ACADEMIC CONTEXT

Focusing on the academic context, six major reading purposes can be distinguished
(Grabe, 2009) which necessitate different reading skills.
1. Reading in order to find information is a common purpose in any L1 or L2
classroom. The required skills include skimming and scanning which enable one to
search for the necessary information on the surface or in depth.

2. Another reading goal is to read for quick understanding which activates skimming

3. The third purpose is to read in order to learn. Reading to learn in an academic

context involves various complex processes such as organizing and recalling
information, or connecting text content with prior knowledge.

4. Reading to integrate information is another reading purpose. This purpose is

more challenging for students as the information they read has to be synthesized
and learnt so that it can be integrated.

5. Particularly in academic settings, students also read to evaluate, critique and use
information. This complex reading purpose necessitates numerous skills from the
readers like connecting new information to prior knowledge and readings, making
decisions while reading, reflecting on text information or reinterpreting the text for the
reader's purposes.
6. Lastly, probably the most common reading purpose starting from very low levels is
reading for general comprehension This kind of reading takes places both in the
L2 classroom and outside the classroom when one reads a text for pleasure.
Although reading for general comprehension is part of our daily activities, it is
important to note
that “it is both fundamental to reading and most often misunderstood as easy
reading – but it is not easy”. It requires several complex reading processes from the
reader which become automatic, thus “become seemingly effortless” (and form a
solid basis for the remaining reading purposes and reading types.

Apart from reading skills, reading strategies such as paraphrasing, or predicting are also
vital to assist text comprehension. These cognitive strategies are essential for fluent readers
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not only to remove reading obstacles but also to facilitate deep comprehension instead of being
content with the “shallow levels of analysis” (Graesser, 2007, p. 4). Therefore, these strategies
enable not only beginner but skilled readers as well when they encounter unfamiliar or
challenging texts. These strategies focus on several areas that support text comprehension:
grammatical knowledge, processing skills and background knowledge.

Reading Selection:

I’m Nobody! Who are you?

Emily Dickinson

First Published Version (Posthumous) 1891:

I'm nobody! Who are you?

Are you nobody too?

Then there's a pair of us — don't tell!

They'd banish us; you know!

How dreary to be somebody!

How public like a frog

To tell one's name the livelong day

To an admiring bog!

Questions: 30 points.

1. Write the meaning of the words you don’t understand.

2. What would you like to be? A nobody or somebody? Why?
3. Why do some people seek fame? What could be their reason/s?
4. Explain the pros and cons (advantages and disadvantages) of being a nobody or
somebody.