A Task-Based Approach to Reading English for Specialized Purposes

           

 

Gusti Astika

 

 

The teaching of reading English for specialized purposes for professional students has not received much attention. In recent years the number of students who want to obtain a Master degree in various fields of specialization in Indonesia has been increasing. These students are generally professionals in their respective jobs who wish to obtain higher university degrees in order to move up on their career ladder. However, their English proficiency is insufficient to cope with reading assignments which are usually taken from textbooks in their specialized disciplines. A high level of reading ability is required of these students in order to accomplish their academic tasks such as getting information for thesis writing. This paper discusses an approach to teaching reading to such students. The approach is based on the interactive processes of reading (Eskey & Grabe, 1989) and the principles of task-based language teaching proposed by Willis (1996). The teaching procedures described in this paper is derived from my teaching experience in teaching reading to professional students majoring in Education at Satya Wacana University, Salatiga, Indonesia.

 

 

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Astika, G. (2004, April). A task-based approach to reading English for specialized purposes. Paper presented at the RELC International Seminar on Approaches to Reading and Writing Instruction, Singapore.

 

 

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