Reading Comprehension

When it comes to reading comprehension and academic vocabulary development, how do you ensure all students have adequate access to word meaning and background knowledge? What supports and activities do you include in your lessons to help students accurately use and recall new words and meanings?  

Multimedia tools and classroom experiences can be a great way to help all students learn and understand new words and concepts, as well as larger text-to-world relations. Student comprehension and background knowledge can be greatly enhanced through the inclusion of pictures, physical artifacts, sounds, and tastes into lessons and units. Including such resources can be extremely important for those students developing their academic English vocabulary—by seeing and physically interacting with sensory objects, such students may be able to better connect word-meaning relationships (and even draw parallels between their home and instructional languages). When examining what words might need additional support to ensure student comprehension, it is necessary to consider how words are used, their importance in the text, the context and weight those words might carry in the overall story, the level of familiarity, and what other background knowledge is needed to understand the word and its use.  

For a look at some ideas on incorporating multimedia comprehension supports into your classroom, as well as one instructor’s experience doing so with reading activities, check out this article from Reading Rockets.

Have you heard of the ‘Whole Language’ versus ‘Phonics’ debate? Sometimes referred to in this way, this regards two varying ideas about how children learn to read and how teachers should implement literacy instruction. Another description of the two perspectives might be “skill-building”.

Those who promote comprehension based (whole language) instruction suggest that we learn to read by reading. Therefore, teachers should focus on introducing students to reading and exposing them to a wide range of texts (including, for example, also those not found directly in books). This approach suggests that making texts more accessible and comprehensible will promote life-long readers better equipped to gain knowledge of vocabulary, register and writing style, spelling, and advanced grammatical competence.

Skills-building proponents might suggest that students should have explicit, direct instruction in the phonetic patterns of English so they can use knowledge of these patterns to build new skills as they read, through sounding words out and applying the general rules of patterns. They would further propose that in order to truly become skilled readers, children should learn the essential base blocks of the English language, letters, letter sounds, and general phonetic patterns (see National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, 2002).  

One way to benefit from both perspectives might be a balanced approach by blending the two. This could involve providing students with a grounding in some of the basic phonetic patterns in English, while also sharing open and frequent opportunities to engage with a diverse range of meaningful and authentic texts.

How do you help develop your students’ reading comprehension skills? Have you ever tried paragraph shrinking?

In this technique, students “shrink” each paragraph they read in order to get at the main idea. To do this, students analyze each paragraph in light of three prompts:

• Name the who or what.
• Tell the most important thing about the who or what.
• Say the main idea in 10 words or less.

Students work together as pairs, taking turns being either the “Coach” or the “Player.” When the pair accomplishes the steps above, they are awarded points.

To learn more about paragraph shrinking, including handouts, question cards, aligned children’s books, and a PowerPoint presentation, visit the Reading Rockets website.

How do you choose books to integrate into your instruction?

What sorts of reading and instructional materials do you make available for your students?

Research has shown that students’ development of knowledge and perceptions of both themselves and others is significantly affected by the classroom instructional materials they encounter (Hirschfelder, 1982); this is especially true for EL students and others who might also be navigating the acculturation process at the same time (Ndura, 2004).  An important first step in designing an inclusive classroom is to critically analyze students’ access to instructional materials; this includes asking who is being represented, how they are being represented, and whether materials are representative of diverse cultures and the lived experiences of students in your classroom. Another key issue for English learners involves whether texts in students’ native languages are available.

Also, this article discusses the limited extent to which diversity is represented in publishing.

For identifying diverse books that might make beneficial additions to your school or classroom library, take a look at this starter list from NPR.

Resources 

Hirschfelder, A. (1982) American Indian stereotypes in the World of Children: A Reader and Bibliography. Metuchen, NJ: The Scarecrow Press. 

Ndura, E. (2004). ESL and Cultural Bias: An Analysis of Elementary Through High School Textbooks in the Western United States of America. Language, Culture and Curriculum, 17, 143-153. 

According to recent studies, visual aids can support students’ reading comprehension even better than other strategies such as skimming, scanning, and note making. While research in pedagogy and psychology has shown that visual learning is among the most effective methods for teaching comprehension skills to students of all ages, recent work has further suggested the benefits of using graphic organizers and visual learning materials with ELs in particular. Graphic organizers and visual representation models are a strong tool to use with English learner students as they provide a way to track and represent main ideas, supporting details, facts, opinions, comparisons and contradictions—all of which contribute to students’ greater understanding of the text as a whole.

Resources

Koda, K. (2007). Reading and language learning: Cross linguistic constraints on second language reading development. Language Learning, 57(1), 1-44.

Praveen Sam, D. &, Rajan, P. (2013). Using graphic organizers to improve reading comprehension skills for the middle school ESL student. English Language Teaching, 6(2), 155- 170.

Slavin, R. E. (2011). Educational Psychology: Theory and Practice. NY: Pearson.

An easy way to increase reading comprehension, while also empowering students with the tools and knowledge to run their own discussions on texts, is the reciprocal teaching strategy.

This is a dialogue-based reading comprehension strategy that focuses on four main aspects of reading comprehension: summarizing, questioning, clarifying, and predicting. This strategy is also beneficial because, while initially it can be modeled and used between teachers and students, it is also a very tool that students can use in small group or individual work to help develop the skills necessary for monitoring their own reading comprehension and leading group discussions.

For a very brief overview of what reciprocal teaching looks like, check out this short, three-minute video from Reading Rockets, in which reading expert, Shira Lubliner, guides students through how to have a conversation about a book using the reciprocal teaching strategy.

There are also handouts and resources you can use in your classroom to help remind students about the different aspects of the reciprocal teaching strategy and what kind of questions to ask when they encounter various texts or passages.

See this worksheet example that you can take and use in your classroom!

Or, for handouts that remind students of the different steps (i.e. summarizing, questioning, clarifying, and predicting) in the reciprocal teaching strategy, check out this packet you can share with students, this excellent summary handout.

The added benefit of the reciprocal teaching strategy is that it empowers all students with the skills and tools necessary for not only increasing their own reading comprehension, but also the skills and tools necessary to facilitate discussions about texts. As students become more familiar with the roles, steps, and discussion techniques of the reciprocal model, the teacher’s role and direct involvement should decrease.

Why not try it in your classroom today?!

How do you structure classroom reading time? What activities, tools, and strategies do you use to give students ample time for meaningful engagement with texts, enabling them not only to develop their academic English reading and writing ability, but also to build close reading and critical thinking skills?

One often-used strategy is Carousel Reading, in which students work in small groups to read passages/texts, and then respond to questions orally, in writing, or even through drawings. While this can be a good activity for occasional use, it does pose some challenges for developing reading, writing, and critical thinking skills. One of the primary critiques of carousel activities is that instructional modeling time is cut drastically, and students are left to navigate some aspects of the language learning process on their own, without full language support—a challenging endeavor for any student, but particularly for English learners. Due to the manner in which carousel activities split up the classroom into small groups working simultaneously, some educators have opted to return to reading and responding to texts through the whole-class model.

For a brief discussion about whole-class reading, including an overview of supports that are necessary for meeting the needs of all students, check out this article.

Did you know that providing culturally relevant texts and books in the classroom has been shown to encourage greater reader engagement, improve reading achievement, and increase reading proficiency (Ebe, 2011)?

Making culturally responsive reading materials available in your classroom can be a great first step to helping students develop their English language skills, sometimes even alongside their home language skills. The difficulty for instructors is often where to start and how to determine if a text is culturally responsive or representative of your students’ backgrounds and experiences. Fortunately, a lot of this work has already been done for you!

Check out this NPR article about great books to inspire English language learners, and learn how these books can be a wonderful stepping stone for learners at the elementary levels.

For literature published in 2016 for Spanish-speaking students, check out this great book list from Latinx.

Or, for a look at some culturally responsive picture books to use with students, visit this helpful list from Colorín Colorado.

A central component of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) is that students are able to read, understand, and interact with increasingly complex texts. While the CCSS often require students to make connections between the text and the larger world, the standards also encourage students to look closer into the text and develop evidence-based reasoning and critical thinking skills. 

Helping students develop close reading skills can be a challenging process, especially in classrooms where students are still working to develop their academic and conversational English skills. However, by using instructional techniques such as the Close Reading Protocol, educators can help students develop the reading, researching, and critical thinking skills needed to engage deeply with texts.

For more information about the Close Reading Protocol (CRP), and an example of how you can structure an activity using the CRP model in your classroom, check out this strategy outline from Facing History. 

Research suggests that reading comprehension, especially for second language learners, is primarily the product of word decoding, vocabulary knowledge, morpho-syntactic processing, and oral text comprehension (Bernhardt, 2000, 2005; Droop & Verhoeven, 2003). Literature from the field of second language reading comprehension also emphasizes the fact that prior personal experience, beyond basic linguistic knowledge, also plays a critical role in helping the reader create context and meaning from the text (Droop & Verhoeven, 1998; García, 1991; Jiménez, García & Pearson, 1995).  Another extremely important factor, especially in the case of reading comprehension with ELs, is previous experience with reading, writing, and production in the home language (Bernhardt, 2000; García, 2000; Nassaji, 2007).

Teachers shouldn’t limit literacy strategies to targeting just language—rather, they should also be sure to account for native language development and literacy skills, background knowledge of the content, as well as the personal experiences students bring to the classroom.

Resources

Bernhardt, E.B. (2000). Second-language reading as a case study of reading scholarship in the 20th century. In M.L. Kamil, P.B. Mosenthal, P.D. Pearson & R. Barr (Eds.), Handbook of reading research. (pp. 791–811). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Bernhardt, E.B. (2005). Progress and procrastination in second language reading. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 25, 133–150.

Droop, M., & Verhoeven, L. (1998). Background knowledge, linguistic complexity, and second-language reading comprehension. Journal of Literacy Research, 30(2), 253–271.

Droop, M., & Verhoeven, L. (2003). Language proficiency and reading ability in first-and second-language learners. Reading Research Quarterly, 38(1), 78–103.

García, G.E. (2000). Bilingual children’s reading. In M.L. Kamil, P.B. Mosenthal, P.D. Pearson & R. Barr (Eds.), Handbook of reading research. (pp. 813–834). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Jiménez, R.T., García, G.E., & Pearson, P.D. (1995). Three children, two languages, and strategic reading: Case studies in bilingual/monolingual reading. American Educational Research Journal, 32, 31–61.

Nassaji, H. (2007). Schema theory and knowledge-based processes in second language reading comprehension: A need for alternative perspectives. Language Learning, 57, 79–113.

How do you help students engage with readings and process the information contained in them? It is often challenging to identify classroom activities that accomplish these two goals. Fortunately, there are thousands of activities and strategies (pre-, during, and post-reading) that assist students with parsing information, making sense of what they read, and drawing parallels to the larger world. Furthermore, through the integration of language supports and additional reading activities, all students become empowered to connect with the reading material. To get started, check out Reading Rockets for a helpful list of 103 activities for before, during, and after reading

How do you engage all students around reading and analyzing historical documents and concepts in your classroom?

When it comes to history and social science instruction, the Common Core State Standards encourage students to develop their reading and critical thinking skills by applying their learned and prior knowledge. However, for some ELs who might still be working to develop their reading skills and might have limited prior knowledge on certain subjects, this can often be troublesome, especially when it comes to understanding and picking out cause and effect relationships in historical events.

A great activity that you can use in your classroom is the Iceberg activity. This is a visual/graphic organizational tool that you can use to help students pick out and highlight some of the cause and effect relationships (or what was “beneath the surface”) that led to historical events. This strategy not only helps students think critically about information they have learned and already know, but also provides a format and framework that limits the amount of text and students are presented with, in a format that is easy to remember and could be answered using a variety of ways ( drawings, words, images, etc.).

For a closer look at some examples of how the iceberg activity can be used in a classroom, along with some modifications and variations for students at different grade levels, check out this excellent resource from Facing History. 

For all students, working to hone reading and textual analysis skills can be challenging. While working on textual analysis skills, students are not only responsible for being able to read what is on the page, but also for being able to think critically about how the actions, plot, characters, and their understanding of the world interact and connect within the text. This often requires learning to pay attention to details in the text, and working on note taking and recall from the text.

The literary graffiti activity is one way to help students hone their recall and textual analysis skills. In this activity, as students are reading, they take notes using visual imagery (drawings, shapes, designs, colors, symbols, etc.) to develop a graphical reconstruction of the text or a section of the text. Students can then share the drawings and discuss why they decided to render it this way, and what examples from the text led them to their graphical representation. This activity reinforces detailed reading, and offers an opportunity to train aspects of literary analysis: students must think critically when deciding how to depict the text graphically and choosing which textual elements to emphasize. And of course, the exercise of trying to represent a text without using words can be stimulating in and of itself.

The literary graffiti activity is also a great addition to reading units and lessons for EL students, as the activity allows students to use images to take notes and develop ideas, rather than relying solely upon words, sentences, and paragraphs. Through the literary graffiti tool, students can help themselves remember specific aspects of the story, plot, or text by using visual organization and visual cues, rather than traditional note-taking and written devices.

For a closer look at the activity, as well as some sample units and lessons for various grades, we highly recommend this Student Interactive from ReadWriteThink. 

What strategies and tools do you use to help encourage interactive reading and promote reading comprehension in your classroom, particularly for intermediate readers? 

EL students who are intermediate readers usually bring large sight vocabularies to the classroom, are fairly well versed in a number of different reading forms and genres, and have reading and speaking fluency that allows them, for the most part, to negotiate meaning orally with peers or in a large group setting. However, even though intermediate readers are usually fairly fluent in reading, they often still struggle with texts that present new vocabulary, especially when used in unfamiliar contexts.

Providing the scaffolding for students to integrate prior knowledge, make predictions, and confirm or refute these predictions, both encourages engagement, as well as provides reading support around vocabulary, genre, and context.

One approach to supporting intermediate readers is the Directed Reading Thinking Activity (DRTA).  In this model, students are taught to make predictions and ask questions before reading a text, which also helps them monitor comprehension while reading.

For a closer look at DRTA, see this brief overview from Reading Rockets.

“Fake news” has quickly emerged as one of 2017’s trending topics. Even those who paid little attention to politics in recent months have likely encountered discussions about fake news—what it is, what it isn’t, who it is, and what aspects are fake. In an age of greatly expanded access to information, when articles supporting any viewpoint are readily available, how do educators ensure that their students become news-literate citizens of the twenty-first century?

The Common Core standards for ELA, Science, and Social Studies/History all emphasize the critical exploration of sources, including consideration of bias, point of view, evidence, and facts presented, as well as strategies and techniques used for delivery—moreover, these are essential aspects in working with primary sources and non-fiction texts. For ELs, learning to critically examine non-fiction and primary sources can pose a challenge; fortunately, there are now excellent lesson plans available to assist all students in becoming news-literate.

For a look at how students can evaluate sources and bias, check out this sample lesson from the New York Times.

Or, for further discussion on this important topic, take a look at this article by Larry Ferlazzo, with many links to additional resources and lessons

How do you make sure students are accurately understanding and following along with the presented material in the classroom? How do you incorporate both formal and informal assessment strategies into your lessons and units?

Understanding how and what students are learning, or what they are not learning, is essential for planning revision and future lessons. In classrooms with students who are also working to develop their academic English skills, it is particularly important to incorporate assessment to ensure that they are accessing the content and presented materials of your lessons and units, and this can also help you identify suitable scaffolding or teaching strategies.

However, assessment does not always need to be formal. A simple way to collect and track student comprehension in the classroom is through a strategy called Exit Cards. This strategy is an informal way (not based on number of points earned) for instructors to assess immediately what students have understood from the lesson and work, as well as what topics, learning strategies, or revising might be needed before moving on. In the Exit Card Strategy, students are given a sheet of paper with several questions on it to gauge their comprehension and understanding. These questions can be open-ended (e.g., “What are three things you learned today?”), self-evaluations (e.g., “Evaluate your participation. What did you do well, and what do you need to work on?”), or more specific questions on the material covered (e.g., “Name three key players in the American Revolution”). The Exit Card can also be a great tool for collecting student questions that might not have been asked or answered in class. Additionally, for younger grades, or for students still refining their academic English writing skills, the Exit Card might be modified to allow students to provide input through drawing or by selecting images (e.g., students choose between different smiley faces on how they feel they participated in the classroom activity, students might be allowed to draw their favorite moment or thing learned in a lesson, etc.).

For a simple guide to the Exit Card instructional Strategy, plus some of its variations, take a look at this brief article from Facing History.