ALEXANDER POPOV

Creativity and Reading Comprehension

GENERAL I started my academic career as an English teacher at a technicalBACKGROUND college in what was then the U.S.S.R. In the late 19705, we were

advised by the Ministryof Higher Education to "teach our prospective professionals toread and comprehend the technical texts conceming the subjects of their specificinterests so that they would be able to discuss their professional problems with theforeign colleagues in cases of personal contact" At the time, our estimate of theprobability of our students having personal contacts with foreign colleagues apprcd­mated zero. On the other hand, the availabilityof English publications in the technicalfields of concem was very good. (As a side note, now the situation is reversed. Travellingbusiness representatives and experts in managementand marketing have overcrowdedthe country, while hard currency for purchasing periodicals and books is difficult toobtain.)

The language teachers used techniques similar to those that have been practicedsince the babel of tongues. The students were learning endless listsof words and theteachers, their suits white with chalk dust, were trying to bring them the secrets ofEnglish grammar. Nonstop drillingof the tenses and passivevoice structures was goingon, all aimed at translating English sentences into Russian. The texts were analyzedfrom the viewpoint of linguistics, in terms of Latingrammar. The contentswere ignored.That kind of reading was termed"analyticaL" Though analysis presupposes synthesis,nobody could explain what the"synthetical reading" might mean. The theorystated thata text could be comprehended without being translated, but the practitioners did nottake those speculations seriously because no explanation was give for how it could bedone. The gap between theory and practice has often been a specific feature of theRussian reality.Further, a technical college teacher of language is a university graduatewho has been specializing in the humanities. He is no judge of the problems ofengineering so it is quite natural for him not to touch the contents of a technicalengineering text.

OBSERVATIONS At first I did not intend to carry out any pedagogical research.Young and inexperienced, Icould have followed the path beaten by

the "old masters" of my institution. My students were reading (and translating) textsdealing with the strength of materials, machine design, power generation, etc. Theresults were poor. As time progressed, I categorized the students as follows:

Objectors: Some students refused to translate boring texts. These texts containedeither very simple information they had learned in their childhood (the earth is roundand rotates on its axis.), or very complex information derived from the last lecture onengineering (When designing a car engine, the following factors should be taken into

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consideration...) They cut classes regularly and crammed to get enough translationsdone at the end of the month in order to pass the course. They hated the work.

Nonsense producers: Some students were unable to translate. I do not mean theirtranslations were wrong, inadequate or inappropriate Russian due to style. Theysimply produced meaningless sentences. Language teachers are fond of collectingsuch "masterpieces" so I provide no examples.

Sense producers: Some students never made such mistakes. Their translationscould be inadequate; they could confuse tenses, voices, comparison degrees ormiscomprehend an entire text, but whatever their mistakes, their translations werealways meaningful.

Guessing: Some students could easily catch the meaning of an unfamiliar word,while others needed to consult a dictionary. Under time pressure, some students wereable to reconstruct the meaning of a whole phrase by two or three words familiar tothem. One student, a lazybones who had cut many classes, made an effort at the end ofthe course to get by with a passing grade. I asked him to do a test translation without adictionary. As his English vocabulary was poor, he confused a "steam boiler" with a..steamer." Having mistaken the latter for the subject of the text, he managed to invent (Isuppose that is the right word) a dramatic narration of its adventures. It was a deluxeproduction as the number of sentences and their structure remained exactly the sameas the original.

TRANSlATING AND I started practicing intensive translating. Each studentwas given anCOMPREHENDING individual text I drifted among the desks, asking the students if

there were any difficulties with the translation. I controlled each step of the nonsenseproducers. Each student then was asked to speak before the class to report theinformation extracted from his text. To save time, I asked them to skip reading thetranslation but to report the contents in Russian in brief. To my great surprise, somestudents were unable to do that, although their translations were excellent. I found,however, that if the assignmentwas given before they started the translation, everythingwent along satisfactorily. Some students were able to reproduce the contents withoutthe preliminary instructions. In short, some students translated the text while otherscomprehended its contents.

Some of my unsuccessful students did not look like blockheads.While they resisted translating the boring technical texts, they readin Russian quite a bit. They were poor at translating but in spite of

their limited English vocabulary, they could catch the essence of a text. Their way ofprocessing the information ofthe text wasdifferent. Theywere intuitive, creative readers.

A text is not just words and phrases. It expresses in verbal form, some situation inwhich objects or concepts relate to each other in some way.The units of the text are notverbal structures but the objects themselves which are termed "text denotates." (A I.Novikov, 1983). The denotates with their interrelations form an integral structure, agestalt A reader reconstructs a gestalt, that is, its elements given in verbal form aresynthesized into nonverbal concepts, a somewhat hieroglyphic presentation of the

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situation described in the text.This is notdone in an analytical, logical manner. Intuitionis a determinant First, the reader sets forth an initial hypothesis of the text contentswhich usually is quite vague; essentially an initial concept Then, as new informationenters the reader's mind asthe reading continues, the hypothesis iscorrected and a newconcept is formed (the gestalt is being reconstructed). The final concept may beidentical with the author's (in cases of adequate comprehension), or it may differ(inadequate comprehension). If no concept is formed, no comprehension hasoccurred. Readerswho excel at this task seldom read word for word. Instead they catchthe whole block of the text, reconstructing the situation by a few signs (key words), andthis is done intuitively.

Thus, some tentative conclusions may be considered. First, the product of textcomprehension activities is non-verbal, Second, synthesis is the main comprehensionoperation. Third, intuition plays an important part in text comprehension. This meansthat the text comprehension process is similar to the process of creative thinking inwhich right brain functions are critically involved (and perhaps dominate). As a result ofthese conclusions I set forth the hypothesis that reading comprehension skills aredirectly related to the creative abilities of a person.

THE sruov My study wasundertaken with 63 freshmen (both male and female)specializing in engineering at the Leningrad Forestry Academy.

Measurements were done in two dimensions; reading comprehension skills andcreativity. The scores were correlated and the ratios determined.

All tests were administered in small groups. The objective comprehension testswere scored in the usual way. The open-ended tests were scored by experts. Thecomprehension test scores were correlated to those of creativity (only totals wereconsidered, although a factorial analysis would be interesting). The data .wereprocessed on an "Iskra" computer using a standard program.

STRUOURING THE This is an old problem. As best I can determine, E.Huey (1968, firstREADING SHILlS edition: 1908) was the first to describe specific reading compre­

hension skills. Much has been done since, both in the Westand in Russia.From 12 (L V.Bankevich, 1978) to 26 (n. I. Gez, 1979) reading comprehension skills have beenidentified. The following skills were selected to be measured:

• aim of reading (an indicator of overall text comprehension)• guessing the subject matter of the text by its title.• guessing the subject matter of the text by key words given.• reconstructing a phrase with some words omitted.• reconstructing a paragraph with some phrases omitted.• sectioning the text into meaningful paragraphs.• writing an abstract.• stating the author's main idea.• criticizing the text.

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Preliminarystudies showed that the correlation between English text comprehensiontest scores and Russian text comprehension test scores is rather high (r=0.517 = 0.801for different sills, p=.05), so only Russian text comprehension skills were scored -to savetime and evaluate the skills themselves rather than command of the language.

To evaluate the students' ability to comprehend the text (the first skill listed above),they were instructed in a misleading way. The students were given the text with someletters and commas missing and they were asked to fill in the missing parts, as if to testtheir Russian spelling and grammar. When the work was done, the texts were takenaway and they were asked to reproduce the contents. The point was that the text whichdescribed the adventures of two boys drifting down a river, contained informationcontradicting common sense. The river followed the contour of the mountainouscountry, running both downhill and uphill. That specific feature of the river wasmentioned three times in the 200 word text.

To evaluate the students' ability to approach the information critically, they weregiven two texts. The instructions were to write an essayon the history of aviation and tostate who was the first man to fly in the air. One text dealt with the unsuccessful Russianinventor, F. Mozhaiskiy who was experimenting with his flying machines in the 1880s.The other was the story of the Wright Brothers. It was not easy to answer the question.Many test pilots assistedMozhaiskiy and the Wright brothers took the place of the pilotAlso, a distracting maneuver was used. The Mozhaiskiy text was distributed to thestudents. Then Iasked them to excuse me for having left the second text in the teacher'sroom. They were told they could start reading while I recovered the second text. Byallowing them to read the first text through, they had enough time to realize that allattempts to launch a machine undertaken by Mozhaiskiy failed (although the textemphasized not that fact, but the conservatism of the authorities in rejecting theinventer's appeals for financing).

CAEATMlV The creative abilities of the students were measured byJ. Guilford'stest of creative thinking. The instructions and time limitations were strictly observed.

AESULTS AND The results of the statistical processing of the data obtained areDISCUSSION shown in Table 1.

Such reading comprehension skills as "making the abstract" developing a criticalapproach to the information, "criticism," are highly correlated with he creativity scores.Stating the author's main idea (that is, to express verbally the non-verbal text concept)and reconstructing the "tom" text (that is, to reconstruct the missing elements of thegestalt and to determine their interrelationships) are also very demonstrative for creativeactivities, but each requires some verbal skills to express one's ideas.

Guessing the phrases and words omitted wasnot highlycorrelated with the creativitymeasures. Perhaps this task can be done not only intuitively but also by way ofcontextual analysis. Another possibility is that the problem turned out to be less difficultthan originally thought with individuals being able to reconstruct the gestalt as a basisfor filling in the phrases.

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Creativity and Reading Comprehension

TABLE 1 Correlation Ratios Between Reading Comprehension & CreativeScores

RankPosition

IIIIIIIVV

VIVIIVIII

IX-XIX-X

Skill

AbstractCriticismMain IdeaComprehension"Tom" TextPhraseParagraphSectioningTitleKeyWords

CorrelationRatio (r)

0.780.740.560.500.400.180.140.070.000.00

CorrelationCharacteristic

HighHighAverageAverageAverageInsignificantInsignificantInsignificantAbsentAbsent

Sectioning, guessing the subject matter by its title, or by the key words were threeeasy tasks and everyone managed to accomplish them.

Reading may be viewed as a form of creative problem-solving at times. A creativeproblem is one whose conditions do not contain all the elements necessary for thesynthesis, or the elements are given in such a way that they are not obvious. Thoughcreative problems are diverse and complex, they seem to conform roughly to certaintypes:

Searching: The elements necessary for the synthesis are unknown but they aregiven in the conditions.

Combining & Recombining: The elements to be synthesized are known but theprinciples of their combination and recombination are to be found.

Reconstructing: Some elements are lacking in the conditions and to make thesynthesis, one must find them somewhere else.

Constructing: All the elements are lacking.Transforming: The elements given in the conditions are to be transformed to make

the synthesis.

From this point of view, many text comprehension problems may be treated ascreative ones. Making the abstract requires searching for relevant information (the firstorder text denotates) and combining the denotates into the new text concept, as the newtext is to be produced.

Criticism of the text is a. more complicated problem. Not only must a personreconstruct the text concept, but also put it into the general contextofthe problem, thusreconstructing the more general gestalt In the text about the Wright brothers, irrelevant

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AECOm.1ENDATIONSfOR lflNGUAGE

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Joumal of CreatIve BehavIor

information (such as dates,names and information about the test flights), distracted thestudents' attention from the most important fact. The Wright brothers were the first touse ailerons on their aeroplane, which prevented the machine from becomingunbalanced and crashing. Thus, our test was a test of reconstruction problem solvingand only the most creative students were able to answer it correctly.

Identifying an author's main idea is nothing more than comprehending the text.Catching the author's idea is an intuitive act, which is typical of creative thinking.Creative students synthesized the outer gestalt while working on the grammar andspelling. Thus, most noticed contradictions in the text of the two boys floating on theriver. In contrast, the less creative students could reproduce the text but missed thestrange details. When they were later asked to draw a vertical section of the river on ablackboard, they realized the mistake at once (the river running uphill). Creative readersvisualized the situation described, while the less creative students did not

Creative people are fond of reading (e.g. T. Edison, J. Watt, H. Ford, etc.) as theircomprehension is unconscious and easily done. Less creative people often considerreading a hard job, as their comprehension is conscious and analytical. They havedifficulty visualing the situation as described: they are not able to produce the textconcept and identify the author's ideas unless they are expressed verbally (as intextbooks, fables, etc.). Their approach to information is not critical as they believe theauthors rather than the facts. Such illiteracy is common and much can be done inforeign language classes to improve this aspect of reading skills.

Creativity is a universal mechanism given by Nature to a humanbeing to adapt to the changing environment Due to socialinfluences, creativity has been hindered. Personal, social, organiza·

tional, national and other barriers restrict the creative expressions of many. When thenecessity arises, however, a person starts creating. Problems tend to stimulate thatreaction. Therefore, a teacher may invite a creative spark by dipping the students intoproblematic situations. The new and the diverse excite individuals and problems towhich students may find their own solutions may entice more to reach out creatively.

Language teachers are uniquelypositioned to engage in such activities. Some ofthesteps they may consider are:

1. Select reading materials considering the students' interests, using encyclopedias,popular books on science, and similar sources. Many language teachers do thisnow.

2. Select five or seventexts on the same subject. Each will illuminate the subject froma different viewpoint and the students often enjoy the comparison.

3. Engage the students' guessing skills. Let them study the titles of the texts andhypothesize about the subject matter of the selection. Ask them to list all thepossible key words (in native language).

4. From the previous list ofkeywords, ask the students to select the most informativeones; those that identify the subject matterof the text. Once they have practiced thisselection process for relevant information, the key words can be translated in toappropriate language.

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5. Ask the students to group the words into semantic classes for better memorizing.This divergent problem allows many versions. Discuss the outcomes with them tochoose an optimal one.

6. Study polysemantic words. Ask the students to write all the meanings of the wordfrom a large dictionary. Try to help the students catch the general meaning of theword (its concept).

7. Before starting to read the text, ask the students to hypothesize about the contents.This forms the initial text concept. If it does not match the author's, a problematicsituation will occur during reading. A false hypothesis may be allowed to developpurposely.

8. Caution: do not abuse translation. Ask the students to do drawings, sketches,diagrams. The more abstract the contents, the more interesting the work. In myexperience, the more creative students will be the most active in this task eventhough their drawing skill may be limited.

9. Encourage students to comprehend the text without translating it Control thosewho consult the dictionary excessively. Strive to improve the students' guessingskills.

10. The most puzzling phrases (from the linguistic point of view) should be translated toavoid miscomprehension.

11. Ask the students to formulate the author's main ideas.12. One of two texts should lack titles. Ask the students to invent those titles

themselves. Discuss the many outcomes.13. Ask the beginning students to reproduce the contents ofthe text in native language.14. Ask the students to put questions not to the text but to the situation described.

Encourage the "why" questions and those that cannot be answered based on thetext content

15. Occasionally, before the students start reading the texts on the subject chosen (fiveto seven), give them an assignment to write an essay on one of the topics. At theend, when all the texts of the selection have been read, discuss the essays.

My experience has shown these approaches to be helpful for students ofall creativeinclinations. The classes seem more interesting and informative, with active thinkingprocesses evidently in use. The more creative students find opportunities to apply theirskills and the less creative students seem to move towards more creative endeavors asthey deal intensively with the problems presented to them.

REFERENCES BANKEVlCH, L V.Testirovaniye leksiki inostrannogo yazyka. Moscow, 1978.GEZ, N. I.0 vzalmosvyazannosti obuchenlya retzeptivynm vidan rechevoy deyatelnosti. In: Nauchnyye trudyMGPllYa. 1979,vyp. 142.HUEY, E. The Psychology and Pedagogyof Reading. Massachusetts, 1968.NOVIKOV, A I.Semantika tekstai yegoformalizatziya. Moscow, 1983.

Alexander Popov,Russia

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