Comprehension Strategies/Skills
By teaching students to use different strategies, helps them to;
- Promote enthusiasm for reading
- Activate background knowledge
- Recognise and clarify purpose for reading
- Select a suitable reading style
- Link existing knowledge to new information
- Review and clarify new vocabulary
- Analyse text organisation
- Raise awareness of the processes involved in reading
It should be noted that; - Most of these strategies suggested are suitable for a range of ages and abilities, and can be adjusted to suit needs
- Need to be taught and modelled to students on multiple occasions
- Most strategies will be more successful if readers are about to discuss the task and share ideas before, during, and after activities
There are a huge number of strategies that you could use as your classroom structure. Here are a couple of examples that we have observed and taught that we found to be effective.
Differentiated Literacy Centres- Margo Southall Research has shown that “the literature circles method improved the reading comprehension skills of students who had low-level reading comprehension… students liked…performing different tasks, [and] discussing and cooperating with their friends over a period of time,” (Avci & Yuksel, 2011, p. 1296) and Differentiated Literacy Centres provides a very similar idea, albeit with a slightly different name. This book (with different copies for different grade levels) features extremely clear and engaging literacy activities with a strong comprehension focus. It guides teachers through the set up and implementation of the program very concisely and comes with visuals and labels that you can photocopy to use in your own class. This was observed being implemented in a Prep class with a focus on comprehension, fluency and word study. The teacher used some of the activities from the book (mainly in the comprehension station) but could also easily add activities that supported other learning strategies, such as incorporating the THRASS chart in the word study station. This book worked well because it incorporated skills that improve comprehension, such as fluency (Wooley, 2008) and studying words that have meaning in their daily lives and learning (Konza, 2011). Reciprocal teaching Reciprocal teaching is a format that involves children taking on some of the teaching responsibility within a small group of their peers. Each child takes on a role (summariser, questioner, clarifier, or predictor) that they use in their group discussion of a text. This structure, when the roles have been clearly explained and modelled to the students by the teacher initially, helps them to “think about their own thought process during reading…learn to be actively involved and monitor comprehension as they read…ask questions during reading…[which] makes the text more comprehensible,” (Rennie, 2014, p. 15). Rennie (2014) allows us to explore further examples of reciprocal teaching by recommending the following links: •http://www.readingrockets.org/strategies/reciprocal_teaching/ •http://www.education.vic.gov.au/school/teachers/teachingresources/discipline/english/proflearn/Pages/guidedread.aspx Prediction Students need to be involved in activities that involve prediction, as efficient readers are constantly making and revising predictions as they seek to make sense of the text. Prediction activities help to identify important information, activate background knowledge, motivate interest and enthusiasm, assist readers to focus on strategies, recognize and clarify purpose of reading. Invite children to predict from;
Prediction activities should be short and stimulating. Select a reading style
Students need to be aware of which reading strategies to use to increase their reading efficiency. Two of these strategies involve skimming and scanning Skimming; involved glancing through material to gain a general impression or overview of content Scanning: Involved glancing through material to locate a specific detail such as name, date or place WOW Words Chart
Create a class chart of interesting words students find during their reading/writing sessions or anytime they are at school. They are then able to write this word down, the meaning of the word and their name and place it on the wall for other students to make a link off. Students can then refer to this chart when they are doing a writing/reading task |
Think Alouds
This strategy encourages students to work independently to breach gaps in their knowledge. The idea is that students verbalize what they are thinking whilst reading a text, allowing them to slow down and monitor their own comprehension as well as re-reading or reading ahead to clarify context (Rennie, 2014). The main purpose of this strategy is to build student skills in building their comprehension independently. It is the "so what?" factor about coming across something the child does not understand. For example, if a student approached the teacher because they found a challenging word, the teacher needs to ensure that the child has taken steps to solve the problem themselves first (e.g. using a dictionary, asking a friend, using picture or context clues) before coming to the teacher. This strategy helps students gain skills that are highly valuable throughout life, and particularly in secondary and further education.
CAFE Literacy Comprehension Program/The Daily 5
Administering the CAFE reading Daily 5 program in your classroom will provide your students with a excellent framework for reading comprehension and what processes and strategies are involved in reading. It allows opportunities for whole class work, group focuses and individual conferencing with students. The Daily 5 promotes independent learners and allows students to partake in the literacy activities that interest them, therefore connecting them with the topic more. Before and After Charts This strategy is suitable for individuals or groups of children. It allows them to develop links and reminds students of what they already know about the information. It also clarifies the purpose for reading. Before reading, students list everything they know about a topic that is being studies (eg. snails). This is documented in a table (as a class or individual). After reading, they write in a different column all the things they have learned and compared the two lists, and then write questions they still need to answer. Recognition Skills
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