1. Strategies to Enhance Technical Reading Skills
Teresa Rogers
Butler County ATC
Summer 2010

2. Objectives Participants will: Review characteristics of good readers
Discuss a variety of instructional strategies for teaching reading skills including:
Modeling
Reading aloud
Think – Alouds
Graphic Organizers
Sticky Notes
Highlighting
Jigsaws
Review fix-up strategies

3. Technical Reading
Many students struggle when confronted with technical or informational materials.
They do not know how to:
Use questions before, during, and after reading
Monitor their reading for comprehension
Use fix-up strategies
Communicate learning through personal response, text connections, or new understandings.

4. Characteristics of Good Readers

5. Organize Text
Recall important details that relate to the author’s purpose and main idea (the big picture)
Recall the sequence
Differentiate between main ideas and less important ideas during and after reading
Use textual aids and visual cues
Consider purposes – author’s, reader’s, teacher’s

6. Connecting to Background Knowledge
Text-to-self – connections that readers make between the text and their past experiences
Text-to-text – connections that readers make between what they are reading and another text
Text-to-world – connections that readers make between what they are reading to the real world

7. Making Inferences and Predictions
Ability to read between the lines to grasp the deeper, often hidden, meaning of the text
Use all aspects of text (e.g., visuals, headings) to create inferences
Reflect on previous texts or experiences to make a connection or assumption
Relate text to current events and classroom themes
Use cause and effect and fact and opinion to infer and predict
Generate relevant predictions with logical evidence that related to main idea and/or author’s purpose
Revise predictions based on new evidence in text

8. Visualizing Creating mental pictures from the words in the text.
Allows the words on the page to become real and concrete.

9. Generating and Answering Questions
Generate relevant implicit and explicit questions to interact with text
Generate questions that the author wants the reader to ask
Use questions before, during and after reading
Actively seek to answer questions during reading

10. Determining Word Meanings
Use sentence structure and semantic clues to predict word meaning
Use context to figure out the meanings of multiple-meaning words
Use knowledge of key vocabulary, prefixes, suffixes, and roots

11. Monitoring One’s Own Comprehension
Use fix-up strategies when comprehension breaks down
Adapt reading and thinking to fit the type of text (narrative/poetry, technical, expository/social science, science, math)

12. Instructional Strategies

13. Model Comprehension
Teachers are the best qualified people to show students how good readers think.
We should model our thinking when reading challenging content texts and performing tasks such as filling in graphic organizers, drawing mental pictures from texts, and creating written responses.

14. Reading aloud is vital for building fluency and language.
Think-alouds are effective ways to show students how proficient readers think while reading.
We can show
the many complex habits that help us comprehend
how much mental work it is to read for meaning
how we also get stuck, figure out words, ask silly questions, make predictions, infer, etc.

15. Scaffolding Student’s Comprehension
Students need to be given opportunities to do what the teacher has modeled.
Teacher assistance gradually diminishes as students master the skill.
We want to do more than help students succeed at specific tasks such as answering questions about a text or filling in charts.
Instead, we want to develop into mental habits that kick in automatically when students read any type of text in the future: SAT tests, DVD machine instructions, newspaper article, project reports, business letters, etc.

16. Giving Mini-lessons
Short and targeted lessons that teach a particular aspect of reading when the need arises.
Introduce skill – let students know what they are about to learn
Teacher modeling – show students the strategy, teacher think alouds are effective
Student modeling and guided practice – have students gradually take charge of the strategy and begin to require less support from you.

17. Written Responses Coding with sticky notes Making notes in the margins
Circling, highlighting, bracketing, and underlining the text

18. Graphic Organizers
A visual representation of knowledge, concepts, or ideas
Help students to see the relationships between facts, terms, ideas, etc.
Can be used in all phases of learning from brainstorming to introduce a topic to presentation of information to review
Can be used as whole group, small group, or individual activity

19. What Type of Materials Do I Use?
Content – articles that support and build background knowledge of the content we are teaching or help students make connections
Strategy practice – short pieces that push our thinking, perhaps demanding that the reader ask questions, infer meaning, or synthesize information to understand
Features – pieces that contain features that signify importance, such as headings, bold print, italics, and captions

20. Form – select a wide variety of different writing forms, including essays, letters, feature articles, and columns to expose students to the different characteristics of each form
Text-structure – use different short-text forms to examine different cue words and text structures.
Perspective – articles that support different opinions
Surprising information

21. Strategies in Practice

22. Making Connections - Oral Responses
Discussion
Small or whole group discussion about various types of connections we make when we read
Verbal Responses
“That reminds me of…”
“I have a connection…”
“Remember when…”

23. Making Connections - Written Responses
Text Codes
R – reminds me of
T-S – text-to-self connection
T-T – text-to-text connection
T-W – text-to-world connection
Two-Column Note Form
Quote or Picture from Text / My Connection
What the Text is About / What It Reminds Me Of
Words in the Text / My Personal Connection
Words in the Text / My Connection to Another Text
Words in the Text / My Connection to an Issue, Event, or Person

24. Questioning - Oral Responses
Discussion
Small or whole group discussion about various questions we have about a topic
Verbal Responses
“I wonder…”
“How come…”
“Why does…”
“I’m confuse about…”
“I’d don’t get it…”

25. Questioning - Written Responses
Text Codes
? – I don’t understand this
Two-Column Note Form
Quote or Picture from Text / My Connection
What the Text is About / What It Makes Me Wonder About
What I Know / What I Wonder
What I Learned / What I Wonder
Questions / Facts

26. Questioning - Other Responses
Question of the Day –
Each day, challenge a different student to come up with a sincere question about a unit of study for others to answer.
Or, use a question from the unit of study as bell work or an exit response
Question Webs
Three Column Note form listing questions “Before, During, and After”

27. Visualizing - Oral Responses
Discussion
Discuss how words in text make pictures in the mind
Verbal Responses
“I get a picture in my mind…”
“I can see …”
“I visualized…”

28. Visualizing - Written Responses
Text Codes
V - visualized
Two-Column Note Form
Quote or Picture from Text / My Mental Image
What the Text is About / What I See
Words on the Page / Picture in My Mind
Words on the Page / My Mental Map of What Happened

29. Visualizing - Other Responses
Drawing what is visualized during reading or after hearing something is read
“Sketch to Stretch” – have students fold a sheet of paper to desired number of squares. As you read section aloud, students draw the process being described

30. Inferring - Oral Responses
Discussion
Discussion about implied meanings, reading between the lines, using old and new information to understand, evaluate, analyze, predict
Verbal Responses
“I think…”
“Maybe it means…”
“I’m guessing that…”
“I predict…”

31. Inferring - Written Responses
Text Codes
I – Inference
P – Prediction
+ - Prediction or inference is confirmed by text
- - Prediction or inference is contraindicated by text
Two-Column Note Form
Quote or Picture from Text / Inference
Facts / Inference
Questions / Inference
Prediction / Confirmed or contraindicated

32. Determining Importance - Oral Responses
Discussion
Discussion about the difference between important facts and interesting facts
Verbal Responses
“This is really important…”
“The main point is…”
“The key thing to remember is…”

33. Determining Importance - Written Responses
Text Codes
I – Important
* - One star – two stars depending on importance
! - Important
Two-Column Note Form
Topic / Details
Words from the Text / Important Ideas
What’s Interesting / What’s Important

34. Synthesizing - Oral Responses
Discussion
Discussion about what students have learned and how they can apply or use that knowledge
Verbal Responses
“I get it…”
“Now I can….”
“Now I know why…”

35. Synthesizing - Written Responses
Text Codes
I – Important
* - One star – two stars depending on importance
! - Important
Two-Column Note Form
Topic / Details
Words from the Text / Important Ideas
What’s Interesting / What’s Important

36. Teaching Fix-Up Strategies
Remind students that good readers monitor their understanding by asking, “Do I understand this?”
If not they use the following fix-up strategies.
Slow your rate of reading, reread
Look back over the text for context clues
Read ahead
Use pictures, graphs, etc. for clues
Use a dictionary or glossary
Read aloud
Ask for help

37. Whole Group Procedure Jigsaw – Allow students to work in groups
Give each group a section of the text
Provide time for students to work on the skill
Allow each group to share their information with the class

38. Classroom Resources Highlighters of different colors
Sticky notes of different colors and sizes
Index cards
A variety of text

39. Summary
Teachers can greatly impact student reading ability by incorporating simple strategies in their everyday lessons.
The success of these strategies can be greatly improved through mini-lessons and by teacher modeling.
Consistent use can help students learn to use these independently and increase their success now and in the future.

40. Works Cited
Wilhelm, Jeffery Improving Comprehension with Think-Aloud Strategies. New York: Scholastic.
Allen, Janet Yellow Brick Roads: Shared and Guided Paths to Independent Reading Portland, ME: Stenhouse.
Harvey, Stephanie Nonfiction Matters. Markham, Ontario. Pembroke
Goudvis, Anne. Harvey, Stephanie Strategies That Work. Markham, Ontario. Pembroke