LARKING Malcolm    Department   Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University  Center for Language Education    Position   Tenured Senior Lecturer
Language	English
Publication Date	2017/03
Type	Research paper (Academic/Professional Journal)
Title	Critical reading strategies in the advanced English classroom
Contribution Type	Single Work
Journal	APU Journal of Language Research
Volume, Issue, Page	2,pp.50-65
Details	The aim of this paper is to inform educators about the latest findings into critical reading strategies based on a comprehensive literature review, identify the frequency of critical reading strategy usage by advanced EFL students, and to outline a procedure by which learners can transition from comprehending a text to critically evaluating it. This paper highlights the most important critical reading strategies for advanced EFL tertiary courses, synthesized from the current findings from the literature on critical reading. In particular, it proposes reading strategies for authentic non-fiction passages, including strategies specific to academic and online media texts that have not been graded for EFL learners. Reading resources for advanced EFL courses can be sourced from a wealth of authentic material but pose challenges in terms of complexity and quality. By adopting critical reading strategies, learners can navigate authentic texts to identify the author’s purpose, persuasive elements and bias to read and respond with an informed perspective. The study also reports on survey findings about the frequency of use of both critical and comprehension based reading strategies by advanced EFL college students. The survey found that comprehension based reading strategies were used more often than critical reading strategies by the participants. Nonetheless, some critical reading strategies such as distinguishing between main and supporting ideas and making relevant inferences were used autonomously by the students. Based on the survey results, this paper identifies a number of critical reading strategies that need greater attention in the classroom, for example identifying rhetorical devices, and describes best practice for teaching them.
ISSN	2432-1370