great number of research on schematheory has been conducted and the achievements have shown that the theory is useful in helping improve students’reading abilityReading is one of an important way of learning English and it is also a selective process.

It involves a use of available least language signals selected from perceptual effort on the basis of the reader’s expectation. Therefore, it has larger input on how to improve students’ reading ability on drawing teachers’ attention. Schemas are mentally presentation of knowledge built through experiences from people, situation or object.

Schema is seen as a background where some information are filled in and others are left blank. It is used to organise knowledge which would make it easier for us to recall. Schema is very helpful for people to understand the current situation help us to and also try to predict what is mostly likely to happen next. The concept schema have been used by different scholars to understand the interactions of key factors affecting the comprehension process. It is also a representation of a plan in the form of an outline. It symbolize knowledge about concepts objects and the relationship they have knowledge with other objects situations, events, sequences of events, actions, and sequence of actions.

This essay will describe schema theory and also by giving more on types of it. Therefore it will explain the contribution this has made to our understanding of reading.Schema theory is a description of how readers use prior knowledge to comprehend and learn from text cited in (Rumelhart ,1980).basically it is about background information. Or rather the certain sequence of how things happened in a past. firstly the term schema was used in psychology by Barlett as an active organisation of past reactions or experiences.

Later schema was introduced in reading when discussing the important the important role of background knowledge in reading comprehension (An,2013). Schema theory is a branch of cognitive science concerned with how the brain structures knowledge. Schema is an organised unit of knowledge for a subject or event.

It is based on past experience and is accessed to guide current understanding or action Pankin, 2013…..however A schema (plural schemata) is a hypothetical mental structure for representing generic concepts stored in memory. It’s a sort of framework, or plan, or script. Schemata are created through experience with people, objects, and events in the world. When we encounter something repeatedly, such as a church or any fellowshipping place normally they pray and sing and it is well known as a holy place where people repent with God, therefore praying and singing are activities that one could give a response if asking that what is the church or rather what you do in church.

This is useful, because if someone tells., because your schema for the restaurant experience can fill in these missing details. Schemata can be seen as the organized background knowledge, which leads us to expect or predict aspects in our interpretation of discourse. What gives structure to that organized mass is the schema, which Bartlett did not propose as a form of arrangement, but as something which remained 5 active and developing (1932; p.201). It is this active feature of discourse that leads to the constructive processes in memory (p.

249). For Yule (1985) the key to the concept of coherence is not something which existsSchema theory has made good contribution to understanding of reading as the research has conducted that there is great number of research on schema theory that has contributed towards to achievements and helping students’ to improve the ability of reading has been conducted and the achievements have shown that the theory is useful in helping improve students’ reading ability(. According to pankin(2013) schemas allows writers and speakers to make assumption about what the reader or listener already knows. Eventually, it contribute a lot to a general knowledge it gives a clarity or draws more context on a certain topic before even getting into details. However An(2013) has also showed that schema theory has good impact by guiding the students to improve from physical thinking to imaginative thinking so that students could love the process of reading, guesing, confirming the text positively and be able to approach it easily. Furthermore it pays little attention to vocabulary and basic language points. So reading in this way tends to be reading process only to acquire information and readers are easy to be satisfied with the general understanding while ignoring language points which need to be mastered.?Xulu Sbusisiwe