1. Make Reading Count

2. Why teach comprehension?
Teaching words alone is not enough!
The ability to read words is necessary for comprehension, but not sufficient
Comprehension uses complicated cognitive processes that take time and practice

3. Text Model Building a structure for comprehension
External building materials
Text
Pictures
Internal building materials
Background knowledge
Word knowledge
Comprehension strategies
Comprehension is an interactive process of building understanding

4. Comprehension breakdowns
Breakdowns in comprehension happen when:
background knowledge is inconsistent with author’s expectation
vocabulary knowledge is inconsistent with author’s expectation
child has limited knowledge of English language
child has few strategies to make processes work together
Good News: Each breakdown area can be taught!
How stories work
How to make inferences
Strategies to build on text model

5. How to teach comprehension
Name strategies
Teach kids when and where to use them
Inappropriate use of strategies are a waste of cognitive energy
Goal: Help kids develop a text model
Start early!
Kindergarteners can learn to use text information to understand what they read

6. PICTURE acronym A tool to remember comprehension strategies
Predict – guess what will happen next
Imagine – visualize, create a mental image
Clarify – make sure your text model makes sense
Try – ask yourself ‘how’ and ‘why’ questions
Use – use what you know, background knowledge
Review – summarize during and after reading
Evaluate – Did this text meet my purposes? How is it connected to other texts?

7. Comprehension-focused classroom
Lots of language
talking as well as reading
conversations about books
Teachers model thinking
ask questions as they read
encourage questions from students
High quality literature
complex books and characters
You can’t teach comprehension quietly!

8. Connecting across grade levels
PICTURE acronym can be applied to all different age groups
CORE program materials offers strategies for use across grades

9. 4th Grade challenge
Why do comprehension scores decrease after 4th grade?
Text is more complex and demanding
Kids are reading in areas with little background knowledge
Reading to build background knowledge
May have word recognition problems or fluency problems

10. What can elementary teachers do?
Make sure kids can decode easily and well
Give kids practice so they can read fluently
Support development of:
Vocabulary
Concept knowledge
Comprehension strategies
Provide chances to interact with teachers, text, and peers

11. Assessment Ask questions!
Ask child to tell you what they understood from the text
Children with dyslexia
Assessment covers a spectrum of language skills, from decoding to comprehension
Dyslexics generally have higher vocabulary and comprehension ability than decoding ability

12. Video: Understanding Themes
Community School 200, Harlem, NY
Theme Scheme
Focuses on underlying theme of story
Helps kids understand messages, lessons
Relates themes to other stories and real life
**video information

13. Helping kids make connections
Build coherent representation
Connect parts of text
Ask kids how pieces of information fit together
Read, then talk about it
Ask “How does that connect with what we read before?”

14. Vocabulary and comprehension
Teaching vocabulary for literacy
Teach little kids big words
Allow kids to practice reading words they already know and words they don’t know (literary words)
Kids learn literary words from books, not from everyday conversation – even in highly educated households
Make words the focus of instructional time everyday
Explaining a definition is not enough
Discuss good and better examples of uses of a sophisticated word (example: “reluctant”)

15. Which words do you teach first?
No hierarchy for word knowledge
Kids can learn complex words early on
One rule:
Must be able to explain word using concrete, simple terms

16. Ramifications of low vocabulary
Knowledge of word meaning and comprehension is almost the same thing
If you have a good vocabulary, you will likely be good at comprehension
Solutions:
Teach big words to little kids
Keep kids engaged with good literature and inspired teaching

17. Children with learning disabilities
Take instruction to a sensory level
Help child experience the word through imagery
Create a picture of the word’s meaning

18. Video: Students Take Charge
Frank Love Elementary School, Seattle, WA
Reciprocal Teaching
Prepares kids to run discussions, taking turns as leaders
Ask questions, generate a good discussion
Summarize, find the main idea
Predict outcomes
**video info

19. Importance of mental images
Good readers “make movies” in their heads when they read
Dual coding theory: reading involves interpreting verbal and nonverbal codes
Interplay between verbal and nonverbal codes gives text meaning
Individual differences alter ability to get meaning from text
Weak decoders have difficulty with verbal code
Weak comprehenders have difficulty with nonverbal code

20. How can teachers improve mental imagery?
Start with mental image of word, then a phrase, then a sentence
Help kids connect images into a connected whole, not just separate images
Harder for kids with weak vocabulary
Research base:
National Reading Panel Report of 2000 cited mental imagery as helpful

21. Mental imagery for ELLs
Research project in Pueblo, Colorado
25,000 children
Low socioeconomic status
High percent minority
Low-achieving on state tests
After 8 years of lessons on imagery and verbal processes, Pueblo out-performed the state

22. Characteristics of successful schools
For comprehension:
Large capacity for collaboration; opportunity for teachers to work together to discuss and practice techniques
For vocabulary:
Willingness to go beyond traditional “look it up and write a sentence” approach to teaching vocabulary
Introduces hard words in interesting ways

23. Impact of federal funding
Reading First money brings new resources to low SES schools
Commercial reading programs that define and highlight comprehension strategies
Classroom libraries – better books!
Institute for Educational Sciences supports research in comprehension

24. Using writing to improve comprehension
Writing is an extension of reading
Expression is a way to interact with text
Utilizes vocabulary, decoding, and mental imagery
Students’ writing should create a mental image for reader
Demands use of adjectives
‘Structure words’ to make writing richer

25. Teaching comprehension to ELLs
Define issues
English labels for words they know in native language?
Difficulty with everyday conversation in new language?
Opportunity to teach older kids (4th grade +) sophisticated words – ELL and native English speakers
Same teaching methods, some unique challenges

26. What can we learn from brain studies?
Studies are starting to focus on reading comprehension
Recent fMRI studies show that parts of the brain relate to mental imagery
Hyperlexia: flip side of dyslexia
Have strong decoding skills and weak comprehension
Often on the autism spectrum
Autism
Studies show autistic children may be able to read individual words, but have difficulty accessing neural connectors to understand what they read

27. Comprehension assessment
Does written evaluation show what kids understand?
Difficult to test whether kids have built a text model
Likely to underestimate comprehension of novice writers and spellers when evaluated in written form
Written test is an important way, but not the only way

28. What can parents do? Volunteer
Read to children and talk about what’s going on, ask questions

29. Final thoughts Nanci Bell:
Comprehension is now getting attention it deserves
Hopeful that we will find new information about sensory components of comprehension
Sharon Walpole:
Both decoding and comprehension are critically important to reading
Both can be taught
Isabel Beck:
Use big words!

30. visit www.readingrockets.org
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