"Finding the key to the secret garden of reading" : extensive reading in the second language classroom

Abstract

The main aim of this paper is to communicate to those concerned with language teaching and to share some ideas on different reading approaches, especially with focus on extensive reading and the use of graded readers in the second language classroom. Furthermore I will make suggestions of how an extensive reading program might benefit language learning in general. Different approaches to reading and vocabulary learning will be presented and evaluated throughout this paper in an attempt to “provide a theoretical and pedagogical foundation for the premise that extensive reading should be an integral part of reading instruction in the second language classroom” (Day and Bamford, 1998:xiii). I believe that if students can develop positive attitudes and an inner motivation for reading in a second language they will experience the pleasure of reading. This will encourage them to continue reading. Just like the characters in Frances Hodgson Burnett‟s novel The Secret Garden planted seeds in the hidden garden and watched it come alive with beauty, the students finding the pleasure and beauty of reading would want to read more and more. For each book read a new “seed” is planted in the readers very own secret garden of reading, and this hidden garden within will become more and more beautiful by each passing day. Extensive reading can be the key to this the secret garden of reading.