English Form 1 – Reading Efficiently and Fluently

Reading Efficiently and Fluently

Demonstrate appropriate comprehension skills

• Use the directory effectively
• Build a wide range of vocabulary

Read the poem below and answer the questions that follow:

Madam and her madam
I worked for a woman,
She wasn’t mean;
But she had a twelve-room
House to clean.
Had to get breakfast,
Dinner, and supper too
Then take care of her children
When I got through.
Wash, iron, and scrub,
Walk the dog around
It was too much,
Nearly broke me down.
I said Madam,
Can it be
You’re trying to make a
Pack horse out of me?
She opened her mouth,
She cried Oh, no!
You know, Alberta,
I love you so!
I said, Madam,
That may be true
But I’ll be dogged
If I love you!
African Poetry for schools.

Intensive Reading

Intensive reading refers to reading carefully a specific text, passage, or story for comprehension. This type of reading helps the learner develop the capacity to identify relevant information, distinguish between main ideas and supporting details in a text, and evaluate ideas critically.

Through intensive reading, learners should also develop the critical awareness necessary to analyse and appreciate literary works. Comprehension, on the other hand, is the ability to read, understand, and remember the information for future use.

Create a drag and drop activity where learners can click on the correct answer by arranging the words in three columns. Column A will be for words showing movement, Column B for words indicating sound, and Column C for words related to sight.

Create a hot spot activity where learners can click on the correct answer. Learners will arrange the sentences given to describe the steady build-up of the storm:

Read the following poem ‘Madam and her Madam’ and attempt the questions and activities that follow.

Include a pictorial depicting the following items:

• Stanza 1 – A big house, outside is a girl gazing at the house with a pail and a broom.
• Stanza 2 – The same girl taking children to school.
• Stanza 3 – The girl walking the dog around.
• Stanza 4 – The girl and madam conversing. The girl’s face is composed but Madam’s face should show surprise.

Note: The line “I’ll be dogged” means under no circumstances should I love you. She cannot bring herself to love her mistress.

She wasn’t mean –
But she had a twelve-room house.
Dinner, and supper too –
Walk the dog around –
I said ‘Madam,
You’re trying to make a
Pack-horse out of me?
She cried, ‘Oh, no!’
I said, ‘Madam,
That may be true –
But I’ll be dogged
If I love you.
Langstone

Comprehension Skills

A comprehension passage tests a wide range of skills. This lesson concentrates on recall, comprehension, and application skills.

The Scandal of Child Labour

Most children help with the work in their homes. They do things like washing clothes, cleaning the house, shopping, cooking, looking after very young children, and working in the shamba. In small families, it can be difficult for parents to do this by themselves. In big families, it is impossible for parents to do all the work, and children therefore have to do their share of the work. This is important because it teaches them useful life skills at a young age.

However, there is a big difference between normal family duties and giving children so much to do that they cannot go to school and have little rest or playtime. This can cause physical or mental illness. Unfortunately, this is what happens in many parts of the world, including African countries such as Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania. This practice is known as child labour. It can happen in the child’s own home but is more common when the child goes out of the home for paid work.

Children do many kinds of paid work. They work on the land, for example on tea or cotton plantations; they work as servants in other people’s homes; they work in factories; they work in mines and in building and construction sites; they work in bars and restaurants; and they work on the streets as beggars. In some cases, they work in the sex industry, in the illegal drugs trade, and as child soldiers.

Why do they do it? They work because their families are very poor and depend on the money the child earns. In many cases, children start working because their parents have become ill with HIV and AIDS-related sicknesses and cannot support the family. Some of the children are orphans and have no one to look after them. Many employers like to use children because they are cheap and can be subjected to all manner of conditions.

Child labour causes many problems. Firstly, children work for long hours and earn very little for their hard work. This results in terrible long-term effects on their lives. In addition, such children do not attend school and are therefore not able to compete with their educated counterparts in the job market, thus leading to a life of poverty. This is not only bad for them but also for the development of the nation. The United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan once said that child labour has serious consequences that stay with the individual and with society for far longer than the years of childhood. Young workers not only face dangerous working conditions but also long-term physical, intellectual, and emotional stress. They endure an adulthood of unemployment, illiteracy, and poverty.

Common forms of child labour

Demonstrate appropriate comprehension and recall skills through answering questions correctly.

• Make short notes from a given passage appropriately.
• Write a short clear summary from the notes.
• Build a wide range of vocabulary.

Comprehension Skills

Comprehension involves reading a text with a view to understanding it both for surface and deeper meaning. To develop comprehension skills effectively, you are expected to read a wide range of texts, selecting essential points and applying inference and deduction where appropriate. The comprehension skills covered in this lesson include recall, comprehension, and application.

State whether the following statements are true or false. Support your answer.

• Children assist their parents.
• Not all work done by children is child labour.
• Working on plantations is the only kind of child labour activity.
• Children normally work to buy their parents cars and good houses.
• Children do not have problems in their working areas.

Give space for writing answers after every question.

Answers:

• True: children assist their parents at home in various chores. For example, in cooking, washing clothes, etc.
• True: children can do some work and as a result even acquire some life skills.
• False: children work in other places also, like in prostitution, as child soldiers, and even in illegal drug trade.
• False: children work for other reasons like sending for themselves and caring for their sick parents.
• False: children have a lot of problems in their working areas. They suffer physical, intellectual, and emotional stress.

Application

This requires you to apply what you have read in the passage. For example:

Attempt the following questions.

• What are some of the child labour activities common in your community?
• What are some of the ways of curbing child labour in our society?
• What should be done to parents who send their children to beg on the streets?

Leave a gap after every question for the learners to write answers.

Probable answers:

• Herding, fishing, prostitution, working in plantations, begging
• Parents should be educated on the importance of education.
• Community leaders like chiefs should be at the forefront in fighting this.
• Employers of children should be prosecuted.
• All those parents who send their children to beg should be arrested.

Provide answer buttons for the learner to check answers.

Insert small boxes in front of the points, such that each time the learner clicks on the main point a tick appears in the box.

Answers: 1, 2, 5, 4.

When reading a comprehension passage, the main points help you in understanding. For it is from these main points that the rest of the passage is developed. The development is done by explaining the points further and giving relevant examples.

Make notes on the following then click on the answer button to check if they are correct:

• The forms of child labour
• Reasons why children engage in paid labour
• The effects of child labour

Insert an alphabet strip so that the learner can type in their answers.

On the same page, provide an answer button so that the learner can view the answers when he/she clicks on it.