From Textbook to Screen: Using Online Authentic Materials to Develop Reading Comprehension Skills

The article explores the shift from traditional textbook reading to online work with authentic materials and how this shift can support the development of reading comprehension skills. Authentic texts are understood as real-life online content such as news articles, blog posts, short reviews, and social media updates that were not originally created for teaching. When these texts are used on digital platforms, learners meet vocabulary, grammar, and discourse patterns in a natural context and see how English functions in real communication.

In the article, key advantages of online authentic materials are outlined: higher motivation, closer connection to learners’ interests, and regular contact with up-to-date language. Attention is paid to simple principles of selecting and adapting texts for different levels, including length, topic relevance, and linguistic difficulty. Examples are given of pre-reading, while-reading, and post-reading tasks that can be organised on digital platforms with the help of hyperlinks, glossaries, comments, and interactive quizzes. As a result, online authentic materials can make reading lessons more meaningful and flexible, encourage independent work, and help learners move from decoding separate words to understanding the overall message of the text.