Scientific ideas of young scientists

 
References: 
1. Evtuk M. Quality assurance in Higher Education - an important condition for the innovative 
development of the state and society. - 2008. - № 1. - P. 70-74. 
 
 

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Scientific ideas of young scientists | Pomysły naukowe młodych naukowców |
Научные идеи молодых ученых 
84 November 2020 
SELECTING AUTHENTIC MATERIALS FOR IMPROVING READING SKILLS 
 
Madina Mirkasimova,
Tashkent state pedagogical
university named after Nizami 
Annotation. This article focused the importance of developing students’ communicative competence 
in reading, classroom and homework activities must resemble real-life reading tasks that involve 
meaningful communication. Reading skills are abilities that pertain to a person's capacity to read, 
comprehend, interpret and decode written language and texts. Exceptional reading skills can be 
highly beneficial to assimilating and responding to written communications like emails, messages, 
letters and other written messages. Using reading skills in the workplace can also be important for 
ensuring effective written communication, which can result in less miscommunication or 
misunderstanding of expectations. 
Key words: reading, authentic, authentic material, communicative competence, language, motivation 
Today’s modern communicative approach to language teaching has brought EFL teachers a different 
understanding of the role of reading in the language classroom and the types of reading materials that 
can be used in instruction. When the goal of instruction in reading is to develop communicative 
competence, everyday reading materials such as train schedules, newspaper articles, travel and 
tourism websites, daily updated blog posts become appropriate classroom materials. The reading 
materials must be authentic when selecting texts for reading lessons. Authentic texts have been 
defined as “…real-life texts, not written for pedagogic purposes”. Authentic texts are written for 
native speakers and contain “real” language. They are “…materials that have been produced to fulfill 
some social purpose in the language community.”[1] Non-authentic texts are especially designed for 
language learning purposes. The language in non-authentic texts is artificial and focusing on 
something that has to be taught. If authentic texts have not been written for language learning 
purposes, but what sources of authentic materials are that can be used in the classroom. 
The common sources of authentic materials that can be used in the classroom are newspapers, 
magazines, TV programs, movies, songs and literature. One of the most useful is the Internet. With 
the help of the Internet both students and teachers use and have access to endless amounts of many 
updated different types of materials. Authentic materials should be the kind of material that students 
will need and want to be able to read when travelling, studying abroad, or using the language in other 
contexts outside the classroom. Authentic materials enable learners to interact in the target language 
out of the classroom. 
When selecting authentic materials, it is worth taking into consideration of the criteria. Nuttall [2] 
gives three main criteria of selecting authentic materials to be used in the classroom Suitability of 
content is the most important of the three where the reading material should relevant to students’ 
needs and motivate them as well as. Exploitability refers to how to develop the students’ competence 
as readers. Readability describes the combination of structural and lexical difficulty of a text, as well 
as referring to the amount of new vocabulary and any new grammatical forms present. It is important 
to assess the right level for the right students. Important factors in selecting authentic reading 
materials.