Teachers can include reading strategies to help students read authentic documents on the web. These strategies will help students be more successful in decoding a challenging passage at every level. These steps can be built into any reading assignment:
Pre-reading and prediction
Before the students begin to read, they can use prior knowledge to predict what information may be in the selection. They can get clues from the title, the subject, or even an accompanying picture.
Skimming/scanning
Students read through the selection quickly to find any additional information. This information can augment and modify information from the pre-reading stage.
Looking for cognates
To further refine the understanding of the passage, the students can look for words that are similar to words in English.
Looking for meaning through context
Students can sometimes get the meaning of unfamiliar words by looking at the context where the words are found.
Careful reading
Too often students begin reading with this step. They find the passage difficult, get discouraged, and quit reading. With the preceding steps, students are better equipped to read a selection.
Application
The application step taps the students' creativity and higher level thinking skills. In this step, the students apply the concepts of the reading passage to a new situation.
Sample lessons World Languages Lesson Plans
Lesson Plan links (Lesson plans and online activities for World Languages): http://www.csun.edu/~hcedu013/eslsp.html
German Websearches: http://german.about.com/library/blwebex_start.htm
German Webactivities (Great list!): http://webgerman.com/german/forms/webforms.htm
Accents, Foreign Scripts: http://tlt.its.psu.edu/suggestions/international/bylanguage/index.html