# data[].attributes.headline
G1-G3 Reading Comprehension Continuum - Ontario Language Curriculum

# data[].attributes.subject
G1-G3 Reading Comprehension Continuum - Ontario Language Curriculum

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Ontario Language Curriculum Comprehension Progression G1-G3

# data[].attributes.headline
Shared Text Planner for Read Aloud or Shared Reading

# data[].attributes.subject
Shared Text Planner for Read Aloud or Shared Reading

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Upper Canada College - Text Sets - October 2024

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Misperceptions abound when it comes to what we think will make us happy. People often believe that happiness will be achieved once they reach a certain milestone, such as finding the perfect partner or landing a particular salary.

Humans, however, are excellent at adapting to new circumstances, which means that people will habituate to their new relationship or wealth, return to a baseline level of happiness, and seek out the next milestone. Fortunately, the same principle applies to setbacks-we are resilient and will most likely find happiness again.

Regarding finances specifically, research shows that the sweet spot for yearly income is between $60,000 and $95,000 a year, not a million-dollar salary. Earnings above $95,000 do not equate to increased well-being; a person earning $150,000 a year will not necessarily be as happy as a person earning a lot less.

The type of thoughts below exemplify these misconceptions about happiness:

"I'll be happy when I'm rich and successful."

"I'll be happy when I'm married to the right person."

"Landing my dream job will make me happy."

"I can't be happy when my relationship has fallen apart."

"I will never recover from this diagnosis."

"The best years of my life are over."

For more, see The Science of Happiness.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Happiness is an electrifying and elusive state. Philosophers, theologians, psychologists, and even economists have long sought to define it. And since the 1990s, a whole branch of psychology-positive psychology-has been dedicated to pinning it down. More than simply positive mood, happiness is a state of well-being that encompasses living a good life, one with a sense of meaning and deep contentment.

# data[].attributes.headline
Structures for Explict Vocab Instruction

# data[].attributes.subject
Structures for Explict Vocab Instruction

# data[].attributes.headline
Vocabulary Strategies - Translanguaging Pedagogy

# data[].attributes.subject
Vocabulary Strategies - Translanguaging Pedagogy

# data[].attributes.body
The Tide Pool Waiys

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
NIST Y4-Y6, 202324- Book Clubs & Research Clubs

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
NIST Y4-Y6, 202324- Book Clubs & Research Clubs (1)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
NIST Y4-Y6, 202324- Book Clubs & Research Clubs (2)

# data[].attributes.headline
KG-G2 Explicit Vocab Instruction Routine

# data[].attributes.subject
KG-G2 Explicit Vocab Instruction Routine

# data[].attributes.headline
G3+ Explicit Vocab Instruction Lesson Planner

# data[].attributes.subject
G3+ Explicit Vocab Instruction Lesson Planner

# data[].attributes.headline
Shared Text Planner for Read Aloud or Shared Reading

# data[].attributes.subject
Shared Text Planner for Read Aloud or Shared Reading

# data[].attributes.headline
Ontario Language Curriculum Vision & Goals

# data[].attributes.subject
Ontario Language Curriculum Vision & Goals

# data[].attributes.headline
G6 Colleen's Interactive Read Aloud Lesson

# data[].attributes.subject
G6 Colleen's Interactive Read Aloud Lesson

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Shared Text Comprehension Planning - G6 UCC

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Shared Text Comprehension Planning - G4 UCC

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Chapter 3 - Team Shared Text Comprehension Planning

# data[].attributes.body
Ideas from: Teaching Reading - Frey, Fisher, Lapp
Photos pg. 175 & 179

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The meaning of pounce. Definition of pounce. Best online English dictionaries for children, with kid-friendly definitions, integrated thesaurus for kids, images, and animations. Spanish and Chinese language support available

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Are we supposed to teach reading strategies or not? I keep coming across contradictory information. Some writers say the research supports strategy teaching and some say that we should teach background information instead. I respect your opinion. What do you think?

RELATED: Can we really teach prosody and why would we want to? Shanahan response:
Many studies - hundreds actually - have shown that teaching comprehension strategies can improve reading comprehension (Filderman, Austin, Boucher, O'Donnell, & Swanson, 2022; National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, 2000). That's a pretty strong argument for teaching strategies.

That's why I've taught them to students myself.

That's why I sometimes use them when I'm reading.

The first question to ask ourselves, it seems to me, is why do strategies help? How do they make someone a better reader?

I remember Dick Venezky telling me that one of the big benefits of phonics instruction was that it got kids to look at the words, to look at all the letters in the words. At the time, I thought that was glib. But over time, I've come to appreciate the wisdom in that explanation.

My answer for why and how strategies work is as glib as that.

Strategies do two things for readers.

First, they require readers to think about a text more than they would if they just read it.

If readers think more about the ideas in a text, they are more likely to remember them later. Strategies slow you down. It takes more time to read a text and implement a strategy than to only read the text.

Too many readers are satisfied with comprehending a text. They may understand it as they read, but they don't retain the information. We use the term "reading comprehension" too generally. When we use it, we usually intend more than just understanding.

No, it often includes the idea that readers should remember what they read so that they can successfully answer questions, participate in discussions, or use the information in some other way.

Strategies arm readers with purposeful actions they can take before, during, and after reading. Basically, they get readers to think about the ideas more than once. They facilitate learning from text. (That's why Ron Carver used to argue that the term comprehension strategies was a misnomer; he thought a more apt label was study skills, skills one would use to study a text or learn from it.)

The idea of strategies is to provide readers with the tools that will allow them to accomplish purposeful learning - and the tools work by slowing us down and getting us to think more than once about the ideas in the text. A rather blunt tool admittedly, but, according to the empirical studies, an effective one.

As such, strategies play a very different role in the reading process than knowledge.

It should not be a choice between the two.

Second, strategies may also play a useful role in guiding student attention to key information in a text. (I tend to think of most strategies as "paying attention strategies.")

When I'm reading something that is very hard for me, I write down the most important idea from each paragraph or section. That ensures that I pay attention to all the key ideas, without the details distracting me.

Other strategies encourage readers to depend on the author's organizational scheme. Doing so focuses attention on certain key information that they may neglect without that strategy.

Further distinguishing knowledge and strategies in reading are those strategies that emphasize making connections between the text and the knowledge that we bring to the text.

Prediction, for instance, is a strategy that leads readers to anticipate what the author will reveal. Predictions require that readers combine information from the text with the knowledge they bring to the text. Predicting is a tool readers can apply in certain reading situations, but it can only work if there is relevant knowledge available.

Inferencing is another such strategy. Readers can be sensitized to the concept that texts won't provide explicitly all the needed information so readers must draw inferences to fill in the blanks and make connections. But the inferencing strategy only works to the extent that there is background knowledge available from which to generate those inferences.

A third strategy that depends on knowledge and encourages readers to connect knowledge to text is comprehension monitoring. With this one, students are taught to pay attention to whether they are understanding a text or if it is making sense. Determining whether something makes sense means that you can compare it with some standard and that standard for this is the knowledge that you bring to the text.

In all these examples, the strategy gives the reader some insights about text (e.g., it has a structure, the text should make sense, text sometimes implies rather than states information) and some action steps that if taken will improve understanding and memory for what is read.

But none of these strategies pays off unless the reader possesses sufficient topical knowledge to make them work.

As such strategies are useful and knowledge is essential.

That sounds like reading lessons would be better off emphasizing the learning of content, rather than developing insights about text and reading and developing actions students can use in a purposeful way to think more about the text.

But that is not necessarily the case. Our emphasis on knowledge should not be the central goal of reading instruction. It should be the central goal of schooling. Yes, kids should read texts worth knowing in their reading lessons and they should be held accountable for the content learning that can be gained from such texts. But learning also needs to come from social studies, science, and the arts, as well as from all the other sources of information that children confront in the media, in their play activities and social interactions, and so on.

Reading strategies are something students are likely to learn only in a reading lesson. As such, they deserve special attention in those lessons.

I don't accept the premise of what you are hearing - that reading lessons should either teach strategies or knowledge. They need to accomplish the former and contribute to the latter.

Although I didn't cite many specific studies in this blog entry, it heavily benefited from the brilliant contributions of the late Ernst Z. Rothkopf, whose pioneering work on "mathemagenic activities" presaged all the strategy research in reading.

READ MORE: Shanahan On Literacy Blog
References
Filderman, M. J., Austin, C. R., Boucher, A. N., O'Donnell, K., & Swanson, E. A. (2022). A meta-analysis of the effects of reading comprehension interventions on the reading comprehension outcomes of struggling readers in third through 12 th grades. Exceptional Children, 88( 2), 163-184. doi.org/10.1177/00144029211050860

National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, NIH, DHHS. (2000). Report of the National Reading Panel: Teaching Children to Read: Reports of the Subgroups (00-4754). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.

Rothkopf, E. Z. (1970). The concept of mathemagenic activities. Review of Educational Research, 40(3), 325-336.

Rothkopf, E. Z. (2008). Reflections on the field: Aspirations of learning science and the practical logic of instructional enterprises. Educational Psychology Review, 20(3), 351-368. doi.org/10.1007/s10648-008-9076-5

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Knowledge or Comprehension Strategies | Shanahan on Literacy

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Learn how to strike the perfect balance between teaching knowledge and comprehension strategies, guided by Shanahan’s expertise in literacy. Read here!