Narrow Reading

Response to: Schmitt, N. & Carter, R., The Lexical Advantages of Narrow Reading for Second Language Learners, TESOL Journal, v9 n1 p4-9 Spr 2000

<- Norbert Schmitt

I found interesting that the author gives a lot of statistics. I was surprised to learn that the estimated number of words required for everyday oral ability is 2000 and 10000 or more for academic texts. However, the text says that we will be able to teach only a small percentage these words in class. The author is trying to promote narrow reading for ESL learners. He says that the probability of learning new words from any single meeting in context is low (somewhere
between 5% or 14% depending on various factors) I learned and realized that it is easy to
find interesting topics for ESL learners in newspapers. In addition, there are a lot of different stories in different newspapers about the same topic which help the learner to internalized new vocabulary more easily. This article is very interesting for ESL teachers and future teachers. The author always supports his ideas with statistics or good arguments. I found a close relationship between narrow reading and the MELS program: narrow reading is often associated with authentic texts. How could we disagree with him? :)

Strategy: Prompts (MELS program p.46)