But, when I checked for comprehension, I would often get the wrong answers. Over something that they just read. My first year of teaching, I was very frustrated with this. My students would look at me blankly when I checked for understanding of what they just read. I would then say "You just read it!" (Blank stare still).
First things first. Reading comprehension is essentially understanding what is being read. If you have a sentence that says:
"Bill ran toward the ball that was on the other side of the street."
Several comprehension questions that could be asked in response to this sentence are:
1) What was Bill running toward?
2) Where was the ball?
3) Why was Bill running toward the ball?
4) What do you think will happen to Bill next?
5) Have you ever been in the same situation as Bill?
Okay, so the first two questions are easily lower-level. Simple understanding of the sentence. The next three questions are a bit harder for students to grasp just reading the text once.
The student will have to background knowledge as to why Bill was running toward the ball. They will need to predict what will happen next to Bill. And, they will need to connect the text to themselves.
Often times, we ask our students those first two questions, and those are pretty easy for students to answer. The answer to these questions is found right in the text. The last two questions the students have to do some digging and some thinking to answer well.
Knowing that there are different types of questions and different reading strategies that help the reader comprehend the text is critical to teaching your students to read well.
Here are a few tips that will help your students succeed, no matter the reading strategy that you're trying to implement and teach:
1) Chunk the reading- I usually limited reading together as a class (or partner reading) to about 10-15 minutes a day. After we would read the story for that amount of time, came assignments, discussion and practice.
2) Check for understanding often-I would check for understanding constantly while we were reading. I had to stop at least 3-4 times on each page to ask questions of the class. Before, I used to ask the class questions as a whole, and not many would participate. I gradually changed my approach to having students discuss and answer the questions in their teams or pairs (in complete sentences) while I wandered around the room eavesdropping. If a student wasn't participating, I would ask them the question and they would have to discuss it with me. :)
3) Always review what was read the day before- Maybe do this as bellwork, but before you start where you left off (midway through a story), make sure you review so that the students will remember a little bit about the plot and characters. This can also apply to previewing a story as well. I liked to preview the stories with my students by telling them a little bit about the author and then telling them something that I really enjoyed about the story when I read it. Often times it would be a certain character or a part of the story. Usually those became the favorite parts that the students liked to read as well.
4) Go over vocabulary- Go over vocabulary with your students. Whether you like to use context clues or the old fashioned method of looking up definitions in the dictionary, be sure that the students know the key vocabulary words, and understand the word meanings when you read.
5) Encourage questions and connections- Encourage your students to ask you questions about the story. Encourage your students to ask themselves questions. Constantly inspire them to do something more than just reading to hear the story.
So many of the stories that we read in class were wonderful, coming of age stories that my students could relate to well. Ask your students questions about how the characters, plot, tone or mood relate to them. Have they ever felt that way before? What did they do in that situation?
6) Reach for more reading- I can't tell you how important this is. I have made this claim since I started teaching reading, and I will always stand by this claim.
The more you read, the better the reader you become.
Encourage students to become active readers. If they want to read ahead in a story, I say let them. Give them recommendations for books to read. Be an active reading teacher- read books for the age level of students you teach. Be ready to give recommendations that your students will love. I can't tell you how many times I have helped students pick books from the library, and how many times they have enjoyed the books I gave them! There was even the time that I recommended Bunnicula to one of my students (he was a little lower level than the others). He loved Bunnicula so much he told me "thank you", and he read the whole series of books within a couple of weeks. AND he passed his state exam.
A love of reading will always take your students far in life.
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