In Defense of CARI
Computer Assisted Reading Instruction
an essay by Sabri g. Bebawi

There has been a stir within the educational community regarding the use of the computer as an instructional tool. Most educators perceive that the computer can combine various capabilities customarily found scattered among other media such as projectors, tape recorders, textbooks and other realias. This results in not only delivering instruction at a much lower level cost, but allowing for individualized instruction of an interactive nature.

Computer Assisted Instruction (CAI) is most commonly presented as a one-on-one mode of teaching. This provides for active interaction between the student and the computer. It further allows the student to progress at her own speed which in turn relieves any worries about the computer reacting negatively or impatiently, and provides a sense of safety much needed in the learning process. In addition to the individualized instruction and the absence of any apprehension or uneasiness on the part of the learner, the computer has the ability to keep records in a way is impractical in other instructional settings. This recorded information is then used by the computer to evaluate the student ongoing performance and to direct future instruction (Eskey and Grabe 1986).

An interactive medium like the computer can be used for evaluating the students reading speed. The student can be instructed to read a passage displayed n the screen and, when she is finished, the computer will evaluate the student speed. Assessment of the students comprehension by means of multiple choice or cloze items could be used to rest presentation speed. The ability to have the student set her own level of instructional difficulty allows the student to progress at her own stride and permits the student to see her own improvement simultaneously. Additionally, since all language skills lead to reading comprehension (Bake 1984), the four language modalities become an integral part of understanding the text.

It is , thus, the consensus that all language skills should receive recognition in the teaching of reading comprehension. CARI utilizes this with an effectiveness that other instructional settings cannot match. With its interactive nature and its combined various capabilities (sound, graphic, integration, evaluation, adaptive instruction, etc.) a computer, using a well-designed software, can combine all skills into a bottom-up or a top-down of instructions; it can even, to be more effective, incorporate the two modes into an effective eclectic interactive approach that no other instructional medium can meet.

Moreover, the computer is efficient in identifying the learners prior knowledge by asking her what she already knows, and providing her with what she needs t o know. The use of Computer Assisted Reading Instruction (CARI) can further provide for easier acquisition of the skills needed for reading comprehension. It can instruct the student in finding information in the reading text, paraphrasing text and answering paraphrase questions about the text, identifying the main idea and themes of text, making inference from text, dealing with logical relationships, developing vocabulary, following directions from text , developing skills for taking reading comprehension tests, and self monitoring of comprehension. (Higgins and Johns 1984).

Even though, some misgivings may be evident in CARI, resolving them is not unworkable. To avoid the problem of the limited text presentation capacity of the average computer, a computer program can refer the learner to the text in the book and focus on pre-and post- reading activities; it can also use shorter texts or short excepts from the original passage. Also, an interactive reading skills instruction that combine bottom-up with top-down methods is nor inaccessible. With very careful design, materials can be developed which branch into instruction in several skills based upon each student's response. We now have the sophisticated computers with extensive memory that make it feasible to carry out such tasks. In fact, much effort is currently being expended on the development of a wide variety of cognitive and high-level complexity CARI activities such as developing reading strategies, and instruction on reading sentences and paragraphs and other activities that can be put to use for vocabulary building purposes. The one characteristic of CARI that sets it apart all other instructional media is its potential for one-on-one interaction with the learner. With advanced computers, the learner is able to concentrated on tasks at hand and not worry much about the physical operation of the computer itself. An advanced computer has the ability to match instruction to the individual aptitudes, knowledge and interests of the student. The student could be instructed to skim or scan the text a timer could be used to encourage faster reading and to keep track of the student's speed. The text might be built around difficult vocabulary arrange in a hierarchy of complexity based upon the correctness and appropriateness of the student's responses,; it can include questions that elicit the student's making inference (Higgins and Johns 1984).

Although some students prefer a passive learning style in which the teacher or the computer plays a more dogmatic role in instruction (Dubin 1986) , these students form a small minority. In academically oriented ESL classes, instruction ought to be designed to encourage students to take a more active part and to exercise a greater amount of control over training they receive.