Teaching Reading:
• Bottom-Up
• Top-Down
What is reading?
The ability to successfully
generate meaning from
text.
What is fluent
reading?
What is fluent
reading?
“The ability to read at an
appropriate rate with
adequate comprehension”
(68).
Anderson, N. J. (2003). Exploring Skills: Reading. In D. Nunan (Ed.), Practical English Language Teaching (pp.
67-86). New York: McGraw-Hill.
What is strategic
reading?
What is strategic
reading?
“The ability of the reader to
use a wide variety of reading
strategies to accomplish a
purpose for reading” (68).
Anderson, N. J. (2003). Exploring Skills: Reading. In D. Nunan (Ed.), Practical English Language Teaching (pp.
67-86). New York: McGraw-Hill.
What is the goal of
reading?
What is the goal of
reading?
Comprehension
Factors that influence
reading comprehension:
Factors that influence reading
comprehension:
• The reader
• The text
• Interaction between the reader and the text:
o Strategies
o Schema
o Purpose for reading
o Manner of reading
• Fluency
Models of Reading
•Bottom-up processing
(decoding)
•Top-down processing
•Interactive approach
Bottom-up Processing
Reader builds meaning from the
smallest units of meaning to
achieve comprehension.
Example
letters letter clusters words phrases
sentences longer text meaning =
comprehension
Top-down Processing
Reader generates meaning by
employing background knowledge,
expectations, assumptions, and
questions, and reads to confirm these
expectations.
Example
Pre-reading activities (i.e. activating schema,
previewing, and predicting) + background
knowledge (cultural, linguistic, syntactic, and
historical) = comprehension
Interactive Approach
Reader uses both bottom-up and
top-down strategies
simultaneously or alternately to
comprehend the text.
Example
Reader uses top-down strategies until he/she
encounters an unfamiliar word, then employs
decoding skills to achieve comprehension.
Interactive Approach
Knowledge base + bottom-up
strategies + top-down strategies =
comprehension
Which model should be
adopted?
The reader must be competent
in both bottom-up and
top-down processing.
Interaction (“balance”) of
bottom-up and top-down
strategies:
Interaction (“balance”) of
bottom-up and top-down
strategies:
Top-down
Interaction (“balance”) of
bottom-up and top-down
strategies:
Bottom-up
Interaction (“balance”) of
bottom-up and top-down
strategies:
Bottom-up Top-down
Interaction (“balance”) of
bottom-up and top-down
strategies:
Bottom-up Top-down
strategies strategies
(“phonics” (“whole
approach) language”
_______________ approach)
_ _______________
_
Examples:
• decoding Bottom-up Top-down
Examples:
• using • using
capitalization background
to infer knowledge
proper nouns • predicting
• graded • guessing the
reader meaning of
approach unknown
• pattern words from
recognition context
• skimming/sca
nning
Models of Reading:
Application
Top-down processing
The kenlig coddlers canly kimpled in the
cumpy kebs.
1) What kind of coddlers were they?
2) What did the coddlers do?
3) How did they do it?
4) Where did they do it?
Models of Reading:
Application
Bottom-up processing
The kenlig coddlers canly kimpled in the
cumpy kebs.
When do you spell words with a C or a K?
•kenlig
•coddlers
•canly
•kimpled
Decoding Strategy: The C and K
Skill
This is the rule:
Listen for the sound of the vowel that
follows.
If the sound /k/ is followed by the vowels
a, o, or u, it will always be spelled with a
“c”.
If you hear the vowels i, or e, it will
always be spelled with a “k”.
Decoding Strategy: The C and K
Skill
C – a, o, u K – i, e
cat kid
cob Ken
cup kin
can keg
Models of Reading:
Application
Bottom-up processing
The kenlig coddlers canly kimpled in the
cumpy kebs.
When do you spell words with a C or a K?
• _enlig
• _oddlers
• _anly
• _impled
• _umpy
• _ebs
Models of Reading:
Application
Bottom-up processing
The kenlig coddlers canly kimpled in the
cumpy kebs.
When do you spell words with a C or a K?
• kenlig
• coddlers
• canly
• kimpled
• cumpy
• kebs
Top-down Strategies:
Application
Step 1: Read the title. Predict what the text is
going to be about.
Step 2: Ask questions:
- What is your purpose for reading this text?
- What type of text is this? (A newspaper
article? A letter? A textbook? A poem?)
- What is a “Jabberwocky”?
Step 3: Activate background knowledge: What
do you know about Lewis Carroll’s style of
writing?
Top-down Strategies:
Application
“Jabberwocky”
By Lewis Carroll
(from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There,
1872)
Top-down Strategies:
Application
“Jabberwocky”
By Lewis Carroll
(from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There,
1872)
`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
Top-down Strategies:
Application
•Which top-down strategies did you use
while reading to help you comprehend
the text?
•Were your top-down strategies enough
to read the text?
•What did you do when you came across
an unfamiliar word?
Bottom-up Strategies:
Application
"That's enough to begin with", Humpty Dumpty
interrupted: "there are plenty of hard words
there. 'Brillig' means four o'clock in the
afternoon--the time when you
begin broilingthings for dinner."
"That'll do very well", said Alice: "and 'slithy'?"
"Well, 'slithy' means 'lithe and slimy'. 'Lithe' is
the same as 'active'. You see it's like a
portmanteau--there are two meanings packed
up into one word."
Bottom-up Strategies:
Application
I see it now", Alice remarked thoughfully: "and what
are 'toves'?"
"Well, 'toves' are something like badgers--they're
something like lizards--and they're something like
corkscrews."
"They must be very curious creatures."
"They are that", said Humpty Dumpty: "also they
make their nests under sun-dials--also they live on
cheese."
"And what's to 'gyre' and to 'gimble'?"
"To 'gyre' is to go round and round like a gyroscope.
To 'gimble' is to make holes like a gimlet."
Bottom-up Strategies:
Application
"And 'the wabe' is the grass plot round a sun-dial, I
suppose?" said Alice, surprised at her own ingenuity.
"Of course it is. It's called 'wabe', you know, because
it goes a long way before it, and a long way behind it-
-"
"And a long way beyond it on each side", Alice
added.
"Exactly so. Well then, 'mimsy' is 'flimsy and
miserable' (there's another portmanteau for you).
And a 'borogove' is a thin shabby-looking bird with its
feathers sticking out all round--something like a live
mop."
Bottom-up Strategies:
Application
"And then 'mome raths'?" said Alice. "If I'm not
giving you too much trouble."
"Well a 'rath' is a sort of green pig, but 'mome'
I'm not certain about. I think it's sort for 'from
home'--meaning that they'd lost their way, you
know."
Bottom-up Strategies:
Application
"And what does 'outgrabe' mean?"
"Well, 'outgribing' is something between bellowing an
whistling, with a kind of sneeze in the middle:
however, you'll hear it done, maybe--down in the
wood yonder--and when you've once heard it, you'll
be quite content. Who's been repeating all that hard
stuff to you?"
"I read it in a book", said Alice.
--Through The Looking Glass, Lewis Carroll
Bottom-up Strategies:
Application
It was four o´clock in the afternoon,
and the active and slimy badgers
moved round and round like a
gyroscope and made holes on the
grass:
All flimsy and miserable were the
borogoves, and the lost pigs
whistled.
Application: Now What?
1) First provide explicit instruction in bottom-
up/decoding strategies, then allow
opportunities to practice bottom-up
strategies in extensive reading materials.
Application: Now What?
2) Use shorter passages to teach intensive
reading skills and longer texts to apply top-
down strategies.
Application: Now What?
3) Select materials for both intensive
(teaching explicit strategies) and
extensive (application of strategies)
purposes. One single text generally
cannot meet both needs.
Application: Now What?
4) When teaching new vocabulary, provide explicit
decoding strategies to enable learners to develop
phonemic awareness.
- rhyming games (mat pat)
- manipulation of beginning, middle, and end of words (mat
pat pet pen)
