Making graded readers: Issues for authors and users

1
Making graded readers Issues for authors and
users

• Rob Waring
• Notre Dame Seishin University

2
How are graded readers written? The process

• Pre-Contract
• Authors submit a one-page proposal outlining
• the entire story its not supposed to be a
  teaser
• the level
• If acceptable, authors submit
• a 2-3 page detailed synopsis
• a sample chapter
• Hopefully a contract is offered. They usually
  have 4-6 months to finish the story.

3
How are graded readers written? The process 2

• Post Contract (development stage)
• Author submits a draft of the whole story
• The story editor makes comments -gt revisions
  until okay
• The text editor ensures the story fits the
  levels linguistic
• guidelines revisions until acceptable
• Production stage
• The work (including art brief and endmatter) are
  handed to
• the production team
• Proof reading, designing, commission art etc.
• Manufacturing and launch
• The book is printed and launched

4
Creating a Graded Reader series syllabus

• Decision are needed to about
• -how the syllabus will complement the
  publishers other materials
• -the number of levels and headwords at each
  level
• -how the levels will fit standard measures e.g.
  CEF, ERF
• Graded Reader Scale, TOEFL, IELTS , Cambridge
  exams etc.
• -which grammatical items are allowable at
  each level
• -which words and phrases to include at each
  level
• -the types of end matter, glossary, comp Qs
  etc.
• -how to find authors / material and compensate
  them
• target schedule of deliverables

5
Making a wordlist

• Decisions need to be made about
• -which words appear at which level
• -whether to use a source corpus to decide
  frequency
• -whether words are selected by frequency,
  utility, range, learnability, L1 similarity,
  according to a published wordlist?
• -what to do with commonly known low frequency
  words e.g. apple, pen, book
• -what to do about low frequency derivatives
  (used vs disused, uselessness excuse vs
  inexcuable)
• -which lexical phrases, phrasal verbs, idioms
  etc. to use
• etc. etc. etc.

6
Editing

• How will you know whether all the words at a
  given level have been used?
• How will you ensure sufficient recycling of words
  at each level?
• What will happen to out of level words?
• What of a text can be out of level?
• What do you do if the grammatical construction is
  the only one that sounds natural but is out of
  level?
• What balance of natural text vs linguistic
  grading. How pure do you want to be?

7
Level 1 lemmatized

• A
• An
• ABOUT
• AFTER
• AGAIN
• AGAINST
• ALL
• ALWAYS
• AND
• ANGRY
• Angrily
• ANY
• Anybody
• Anymore
• Anyone
• Anything
• Anyway
• Anywhere

AS ASK Asking Asks AT AWAY BACK
backs BAD badly BE Am Are Arent
Is Isnt Re S
BEAUTIFUL BECAUSE BEFORE BIG BREAK Breaking
Breaks broken BUILD Builds Building
Buildings BUT BY CAFE cafes CALL Calling
Calls
CAN Cannot COLD Colds COME Comes
Coming DAY Daily Days DIFFERENT
Differences Difference DIFFICULT DO Does
Doesnt
DOWN DRINK Drinking Drinks EARLY EASY
Easily EAT Eating Eats EVERY Everybody
Everyday Everyone Everything
Everywhere FAMILY Families
FAST FEEL Feeling Feelings
Feels FINISH Finishes Finishing FOR FRIEND
Friends FROM GET Gets Getting GIVE
Gives Giving GO
Goes Going GOOD GOODBYE
Bye GREAT GREAT HAPPY Unhappy HAVE Has
Having HE Him His
8
(No Transcript)
9
(No Transcript)
10
(No Transcript)
11
Do you want to be an author?

• Write a proposal and send it to
• waring_robert_at_yahoo.com
• Thank you for your time!!!