Improving EFL Learners Summarizing Skills: Reproduction Techniques in Texts of Different Genres

Memorizing and copying from source texts by EFL learners in their academic assignments have recently been notified as a remarkable problem in higher education contexts and this phenomenon has been acknowledged as a complex and variable issue across cultures by many researchers. Comparisons between learners oral/written reproduction techniques of the learners and their source texts reveal that a significant number rely on memorizing or copying techniques in their summaries. Furthermore, research seems to have garnered little attention towards the potentials of a genre-based instruction of reproduction techniques to EFL learners as a solution to eradicate this problem. This workshop aims to discuss a genre-based approach in pedagogy in order to raise learners consciousness about the textual features and structures of different genres and how they can best realize them in their acceptable summaries. These strategies along with conventional citation, quotation, paraphrasing and synthesizing skills can guarantee learners more proficient performance in their summarizing tasks. Practical summary examples, derived from sample texts in Iran s Iran Language Institute textbooks (at both Young Adults and Adults departments), which are categorized based on their generic structures provide the backdrop for the practicing EFL teachers and participants discussions and contributions during this workshop.