A guide for teachers of second language reading offers ideas for using authentic texts as instructional materials. The guide focuses on how to teach students to become strategic readers and use their background knowledge to enhance comprehension. Schema theory is proposed as a framework for approaching reading tasks, by providing relevant pre- and post-reading activities and selecting an appropriate text. Sample in-class pre-reading, reading, and post-reading exercises based on an appended Portuguese text are presented. It is suggested that, by using such reading activities to activate background knowledge, students are encouraged to think at higher cognitive levels, given the tools to take charge without too much frustration, and exposed to relevant language. Additional texts in Spanish and Italian are appended. There are 29 references. (MSE)