ACTIVATING BACKGROUND KNOWLEDGE: DIGITAL TOOLS IN THE PRE-READING STAGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE LESSONS

Developing reading skills, both in L1 and L2, is crucial for a quality education. In today's changing educational and professional landscape, students must meet traditional reading comprehension and 21st century digital literacy demands. Thus, there is an urgent need to incorporate digital approaches in reading instruction. This paper emphasizes the importance of activating students’ background knowledge before reading tasks, explores schema theory, and discusses the three main stages of a reading lesson. It highlights the pre-reading stage and examines some digital tools for enhancing pre-reading activities, with examples from an innovative class at Yoan Ekzarh Balgarski Secondary School - Shumen during the 2022/2023 and 2023/2024 school years.