Thematic Progress and its Application in the Teaching of ReadingAbstract: Thematic progression is the outline of text content. It is restrictedby genres. An analysis of an expository essay is done to study the relationbetween thematic progression and test content, and its application in theteaching of reading.
Key words: thematic progression, text content genre, teaching reading.
Part 1 Form of thematic progressionMathesius was a founder of the Bulager School. He thought most sentences couldbe delimited two parts early time: One is theme, the other is rheme. Themeusually lies in the front of the sentence, and tells us something about thesubject in communication. But Theme narrates the subject context, which expoundsand explains the subject. So theme stands for known information and rheme is newones. From the value of sentence of view, rheme is important because it passeson the new information. But from the function of text of view, theme is moreimportant because it can express the organization form and logic function withits information. So Halliday also agreed with Mathesius’ theory. He haddifferent view about delimitation of theme and rheme. Halliday thought thattheme includes many contents, including the subject and another parts ofsentence. He brought up the concepts about “simple theme” “multiple theme” and“clause theme”.
According to the theory of the delimitation of theme and rheme, every sentencehas its own theme and rheme. When a sentence is independent, theme and rheme arefor sure. But people often use the language unit in practical communication. Wecall national language as words and writing. In text content, each sentence notonly has relation with grammar and semantic with the development of theme andrheme. Theme’s effect correlates the beginning of the sentence and acts thestarting point of the ending one, too. The correlation, joining andover-relation form thematic progression. Danes sum up patterns of thematicprogression by careful research. They carried out three basic thematicprogressions: simple development type, continuity development type andderivative development type. Huang Yan synthesized the predecessors’ researchachievement and pointed 7 progression of continuity text. So English thematicprogression has several types:
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A: having the same theme, different theme, e.g., Jazz is in part music fordancing, but it is more than that; it is the popular music of the people. It hasa steady unbroken rhythm. It co-exists with popular songs of the moment.
B: having the same rheme. e.g., in Kenya’s Tsabo Game Park, five thousandelephants were slaughtered. In Zambia the game department killed 1,500 elephantsin the Luangwa Valley. In Lusaka and Bdola, elephants were thinned out and theirmeat sold in the butcher’s shops.
C: continuity type. e.g., we elect local, state and federal officials to makelaws. These laws keep order in society. The order of society provides us with asafe living environment.
D: overlapping type. Eg, gaga walked behind his friends quietly. But his friendsdidn’t want him. Gaga followed them to the river and cried loudly.
In fact, when we use the basic progression, we often use them together. So theyare complex.
Part 2. The relation between thematic progression and text content.
The thematic progression reveals the semantic relation among sentences. If we usthematic progression in the text, we may delimit theme and theme according toearly or late turn of sentences. Then clear the author’s thinking. We shallnotice what the author wants to say how to spread out the subject of a talk,when they change the subject and which kind of answer we get in the end of textcontent. So when we finish these, the whole text content will appear in oursights.
Eg, every person has its own special words and expressions that become part ofthe language. One such American expression is “ eager-beaver”. And“eager-beaver” is a person who is always willing and excited to do what isexpected of him. The expression comes from the name of a hard-working animal,the beaver. Beavers are strange-looking creatures. They are rodents, like miceand rats, but much larger. Some weigh more than 25 kg. Beavers have a largeblack, flat tail to help them swim. They also have thick brown hair fur to keepthem warm in cold water. Beavers spend a lot of time in the water building damscreate little lakes or ponds. They work hard to cut down trees, remove branchesand put them together with mud to make dams. Few other animals are so hardworking, and like the animal, the expression” eager-beaver” is in no danger ofdying out.
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This is an expository essay. After finishing reading the text, we should clearthe turn of them. Now we may arrange theme function of above-mentioned texttheme1, every people—theme2, one such American expression—theme3 an“eager-beaver”—theme4, the expression—theme5, beavers—theme6, they—theme7,some—theme8, beavers—theme9, they—theme10, beavers…The article narrates the origin of “eager-beaver” “every people” is the startingpoint. And spreads out the subject, so it is told only one time at the beginningof the text. “Expression” is the content that the writer wanted to say. Toexplain, so it is used three times in the article. From theme5 to theme10 thewriter narrated the eager-beaver’s character step by step. He changed thesubject from theme13 and expressed the effect of the eager-beaver in history.
The theme returned “expression” at the end of the text. Whole text is completebecause it worked in concern with the front and the back.
Now, we know the character of the article: 1, Answer “what is it?” 2, Use thedeductive method to spread. The article emphasized basic main points again. Infact, the definition is used when we discuss conception and feeling.
In the article, having the same theme is the most and has eight times and36,490. Then continuity is the second, five times and 22,790.overlapping is onceand 4,590. Another sentences, liketheme14, theme20 are regarded as derivative.
Theme13 and theme19 are new subjects, but they are also around theme and theme.
So we can draw a conclusion that the purpose of the text is “eager-beaver” whichis the starting point and new subject.
Part 3 The application in the teaching of readingReading comprehension is complex psychological course. Reading tests can checkthe students’ comprehension besides language ability. In teaching of reading,many teachers adopt “bottom-up” teaching methods, noticing that they comprehendto words and sentences. At the time they introduce some reading skills likeshimming, scanning etc. though we can improve student’s ability, students feeldifficult when the teachers ask them to conclude the question.
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The purpose of the thematic progression is that it is simple to make readingcurse. The reading way that the thematic progression stands for is “top-down”,at first we should understand the whole content, then we comprehend the relationamong sentences. So students should get an impression. Then they can find outmain idea and important information. The students are good at distinguishingbetween the main idea and the secondary idea on this basis. It is very importantin reading especially fast reading. So main sentences can express importantinformation, such as narration subject and conclusion. Of course, we can usemany ways like analysis, explanation and so on to tell reader secondary idea,for example, “beaver” is main idea, “few other animals, historians, thesettlers” are secondary idea. But as we know now, main idea is the subject andthe secondary idea is spread out according to main idea. The thematicprogression benefits the subject of paragraph. We can understand author’spurpose and master information of text content by thematic turn.