In the past, reading comprehension was viewed as a merely receptive skill which requires no specific effort on the part of the readers. According to that view, readers play a minimal role in comprehending the messages conveyed by the writer. In contrast with this traditional view of reading comprehension, the recent approaches to reading comprehension place an emphasis on active interaction between the reader and the text (writer) in the process of reading. Teachers in a language classroom have long believed that their students feel difficulty in reading due to their insufficient knowledge about linguistic systems such as vocabulary and syntactic structure. However, with the impact of the schema theory and Goodman’s model of reading comprehension, readers’ background knowledge about the topic has been considered one of the important factors contributing to reading comprehension. Therefore, whether or not the readers can relate their previous knowledge to the text became critical to the success in reading comprehension. In this regard, activating readers’ background knowledge to optimal extent becomes one of the roles for the teacher in a language classroom. The present study claims that reading should be taught more systematically through the stages of pre-reading, during-reading and post-reading. It is also suggested that reading instruction should be integrated with other language skills for more natural and effective learning of a second language. Specifically the present study provides a model for effective reading instruction and a variety of activities in order to enhance students’ understanding of meaning from the texts.