Highlights in Reading Education

“Reading Education” was on the agenda of the Turkish Education Workshop, which was held for the third time this year. The workshop addressed the necessary stages for the formation of reading, its transformation into a habit, and its activation.

The theme of this year’s “3rd Turkish Education Workshop,” organized to reflect on reading, discuss it, and develop new perspectives, was “Reading Education.” The workshop, organized by the İZÜ Department of Turkish Language Teaching, was attended by Istanbul University faculty member Prof. Dr. Deniz Melanlıoğlu and Yıldız Technical University faculty member Dr. Mustafa Özgün Harmankaya.

HARMANKAYA: “THE FIRST SKILL THAT NEEDS TO BE ESTABLISHED IN THE ACT OF READING IS AUTOMATICITY”
In the program moderated by Assoc. Prof. Dr. Osman Özdemir, Dr. Mustafa Özgün Harmankaya, who addressed reading from a cognitive perspective, stated that reading is a process that begins with decoding and continues with constructing meaning. Expressing that automaticity develops through the repetition of a cognitive process, Harmankaya emphasized that the first skill that needs to be established in the reading process is automaticity.

MELANLIOĞLU: “IF MEANING CANNOT BE CONSTRUCTED, IT MEANS READING HAS NOT TAKEN PLACE”
Touching on the affective dimension of reading in the program, Prof. Dr. Deniz Melanlıoğlu stated that the act of reading is completed by constructing meaning and that if meaning cannot be constructed, reading cannot be considered to have taken place. She expressed that experience accompanies the learning process and that as experience increases, meaning construction and effective reading skills develop. Melanlıoğlu also pointed out that turning reading into a task negatively affects reading culture. Referring to the negative effects of the digital age on acquiring reading skills, she stated that reading activities that result in an output can reduce these negative effects.