David Beglar
About
David is the Academic Coordinator for the M.S.Ed. and Ph.D. programs at Temple University, Japan Campus. He has published academic articles in Language Learning, Language Testing, Reading in a Foreign Language, Language Teaching Research, RELC Journal, JALT Journal, and The Language Teacher. He has also recently co-authored the fourth edition of an academic listening textbook, Contemporary Topics 3 (Pearson). His research interests include foreign language assessment, vocabulary acquisition, materials development, and reading fluency development.Sessions
All Levels Extensive Reading and Reading Fluency: Promises and Limitations more
Sat, Sep 6, 09:00-09:45 Asia/Tokyo
A considerable body of empirical research supports the belief that extensive reading is an effective way for second language learners to develop greater reading fluency. However, recent research indicates that extensive reading alone is not the most effective way to promote greater fluency. In this presentation I first review theories of fluency development proposed by cognitive psychologists and synthesize the key ideas in those studies. This synthesis produces a short list of desirable characteristics of fluency-enhancing reading tasks. I then consider how well extensive reading and other types of reading activities have those desirable characteristics, in what ways these activities appear to be lacking, and how their potential weaknesses can be addressed. This analysis shows that although extensive reading is an indispensable part of a fluency-based reading course, fluency development can be enhanced by using supplementary reading tasks.