# data[].attributes.body
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.3.1
Ask and answer questions to demonstrate understanding of a text, referring explicitly to the text as the basis for the answers.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.3.2
Recount stories, including fables, folktales, and myths from diverse cultures; determine the central message, lesson, or moral and explain how it is conveyed through key details in the text.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.3.1
Ask and answer questions to demonstrate understanding of a text, referring explicitly to the text as the basis for the answers.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.3.2
Recount stories, including fables, folktales, and myths from diverse cultures; determine the central message, lesson, or moral and explain how it is conveyed through key details in the text.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.3.3
Describe characters in a story (e.g., their traits, motivations, or feelings) and explain how their actions contribute to the sequence of events

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.3.4
Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, distinguishing literal from nonliteral language.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.3.5
Refer to parts of stories, dramas, and poems when writing or speaking about a text, using terms such as chapter, scene, and stanza; describe how each successive part builds on earlier sections.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.3.7
Explain how specific aspects of a text's illustrations contribute to what is conveyed by the words in a story (e.g., create mood, emphasize aspects of a character or setting)

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.3.9
Compare and contrast the themes, settings, and plots of stories written by the same author about the same or similar characters (e.g., in books from a series)

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.3.10
By the end of the year, read and comprehend literature, including stories, dramas, and poetry, at the high end of the grades 2-3 text complexity band independently and proficiently.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
English Language Arts Standards " Reading: Literature " Grade 3

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.3.1 Ask and answer questions to demonstrate understanding of a text, referring explicitly to the text as the basis for the answers. CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.3.2 Recount stories, including fables, folktales, and myths from diverse cultures; determine the central message, lesson, or moral and explain how it is conveyed through key details in the text.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Who? What? When? Where? Why? | Lesson Plan | Education.com

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Your students are probably used to answering questions. Give them a chance to ask their own with this imaginative lesson on reading comprehension and the ways one can use who, what, when, where, and why.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Who, When, What, Where, Why, and How? | Lesson Plan | Education.com

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Do you have students who are constantly asking what, who, where, why, how, and when? It's your turn to ask now! Have them read various stories and ask them to answer these questions in this lesson.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Fantastic Fables: 5 W's | Lesson Plan | Education.com

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In this lesson, students use highlighters, graphic organizers, and a classic fable to exercise their understanding of key details and main idea in a text. They will use manipulatives to promote visual and kinetic learning styles.

# data[].attributes.body
Fun Song to Introduce the 5 W's

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Good Charlotte - "Who, What, Where, When, Why & How" Music Video (The Electric Company)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
General instructional activities

To correspond with a typical reading lesson, comprehension strategy instruction can be organized into a three-part framework, with specific activities used before, during, and after reading.

Providing instruction such as the following example allows students to see, learn, and use a variety of comprehension strategies as they read. Note, however, that the framework is a general one and represents an array of strategies. All of the strategies in this framework do not have to be used with every text or in every reading situation.

Before Reading

Before reading, the teacher may:

Motivate students through activities that may increase their interest (book talks, dramatic readings, or displays of art related to the text), making the text relevant to students in some way.

Activate students' background knowledge important to the content of the text by discussing what students will read and what they already know about its topic and about the text organization.

Students, with some help from the teacher, may:

Establish a purpose for reading.

Identify and discuss difficult words, phrases, and concepts in the text.

Preview the text (by surveying the title, illustrations, and unusual text structures) to make predictions about its content.

Think, talk, and write about the topic of the text.

During Reading

During reading, the teacher may:

Remind students to use comprehension strategies as they read and to monitor their understanding.

Ask questions that keep students on track and focus their attention on main ideas and important points in the text.

Focus attention on parts in a text that require students to make inferences.

Call on students to summarize key sections or events.

Encourage students to return to any predictions they have made before reading to see if they are confirmed by the text.

Students, with some help from the teacher, may:

Determine and summarize important ideas and supportive details.

Make connections between and among important ideas in the text.

Integrate new ideas with existing background knowledge.

Ask themselves questions about the text.

Sequence events and ideas in the text.

Offer interpretations of and responses to the text.

Check understanding by paraphrasing or restating important and/or difficult sentences and paragraphs.

Visualize characters, settings, or events in a text.

After Reading

After reading, the teacher may:

Guide discussion of the reading.

Ask students to recall and tell in their own words important parts of the text.

Offer students opportunities to respond to the reading in various ways, including through writing, dramatic play, music, readers' theatre, videos, debate, or pantomime.

Students, with some help from the teacher, may:

Evaluate and discuss the ideas encountered in the text.

Apply and extend these ideas to other texts and real life situations.

Summarize what was read by retelling the main ideas.

Discuss ideas for further reading.

Activities and procedures for use with narrative texts

The following are some examples of specific procedures that you can use to help students improve their comprehension of narrative texts.

Retelling

Retelling involves having students orally reconstruct a story that they have read.

Retelling requires students to activate their knowledge of how stories work and apply it to the new reading. As part of retelling, students engage in ordering and summarizing information and in making inferences. The teacher can use retelling as a way to assess how well students comprehend a story, then use this information to help students develop a deeper understanding of what they have read.

The teacher uses explicit instruction, explaining why retelling is useful, modeling the procedure, giving students opportunities to practice, and providing feedback. As the following chart shows, students' retellings should become more detailed as they become better readers.

Types of Retelling

Simple retelling
The student can:

identify and retell the beginning, middle, and end of a story in order.

describe the setting.

identify the problem and the resolution of a problem.

More complete retelling
The student can:

identify and retell events and facts in a sequence.

make inferences to fill in missing information.

identify and retell causes of actions or events and their effects.

Most complete retelling
The student can:

identify and retell a sequence of actions or events.

make inferences to account for events or actions.

offer an evaluation of the story.

Story Maps

Story maps are visual representations of the elements that make up a narrative. The purpose of a story map is to help students focus on the important elements of narratives-theme, characters, settings, problems, plot events, and resolution-and on the relationship among those elements.

Story maps to be used with younger students can be very simple-like the one that follows. These maps focus on a single element, such as the sequence of a simple plot.

With older students, the maps can be more complicated, focusing on several elements. As with retellings, the teacher uses explicit instruction to introduce the procedure, explaining why story maps are useful, then modeling the procedure, giving students opportunities to practice, and providing feedback.

Story Frames

Similar to story maps, story frames are visual representations that focus students' attention on the structure of a story and on how the content of the story fits its structure.

Students use story frames as a way to activate their background knowledge of the elements of story structure and thus to organize and learn new information from a story. Simple story frames require students to provide basic information about the sequence of events in a story:

The problem in the story is ______.
This is a problem because ______.
The problem is solved when ______.
In the end ______.

More complex frames might involve having students supply more detailed information by summarizing sequences of actions or events, or providing factual information to explain problems or motivations.

The procedure encourages students to interact with each other, asking questions, seeking clarifications, and sharing evaluations. Again, as with story maps, the procedure can be simplified for use with younger students - it has been used successfully with grade-one students *- or made more sophisticated for use with older students.

And again, as with the other procedures that have been described, the procedure is introduced through explicit instruction, with the teacher first explaining why story frames are useful, then modeling when and where to use them, guiding students through practice opportunities, and providing corrective feedback along the way.

Directed Reading and Thinking Activity (DRTA)

This procedure focuses on reading as a thinking process. Its intent is to teach children to make predictions throughout reading. Before reading, the teacher asks students to form a purpose for reading and to make predictions about the content of the story to be read.

During reading, the teacher stops students at strategic points in the story to ask students to make additional predictions and to verify, reject, or modify their purposes and predictions.

After reading, the teacher asks students to find and read aloud any part of the text that supports their predictions. Students must use the text to explain their reasoning and to prove the accuracy-or inaccuracy-of their predictions.

Often teachers have students use charts such as the following to record their predictions and information from the text that proves the prediction's accuracy:

Activities and procedures for use with expository text

The following are some procedures teachers use to help students improve their comprehension of expository texts.

K-W-L

The purpose of the K-W-L procedures is to help students become good readers by learning to do the things that good readers do. Specifically it helps students learn to activate their background knowledge and to set purposes for reading.

KWL stands for determining What I Know, What I Want to Learn, and reviewing What I Have Learned. The following chart shows the steps in each part of the procedure:

What I Know

What I Want To Learn

What I Learned

Students discuss what they already know about a topic in the text they will be reading. The teacher has students list ideas and concepts related to the topic, then has them organize their ideas into broad categories.

Students discuss what they want to learn from reading the text and write down specific questions that they think may be answered in the text.

After reading the text, students discuss what they learned from it. They next write what they learned and answer s t u d e n t - g e n e r a t e d questions about topics that were addressed in the text.

As they confirm the information in the Know column of the chart, students relate new information gained from their reading to knowledge they already have. As they generate questions for the Want column, they learn to set their own purposes for reading. Further, because they are reading to answer their own questions, students are more likely actively to monitor their comprehension. By putting information in their own words for the Learned column, students better understand what they know and what they do not know. Proceeding through these steps reinforces students' learning from text, involves them in doing what good readers do, and teaches them about their own reading processes.

Questioning the Author

The Questioning the Author procedure involves discussion, strategy instruction, and self-explanation. It encourages students to reflect on what the author of a selection is trying to say so as to build a mental representation from that information. Teacher and students work collaboratively, reading to resolve confusion and to understand the meaning of the text.

Focusing on a segment of text, the students respond to teacher questions such as the following:

What is the author trying to say?

What does the author mean by this?

o Why is the author saying this?

What is the author getting at?

Through modeling, the teacher helps students to understand that some parts of a text can cause confusion and hinder comprehension. The teacher then discusses with students what they can do when comprehension problems occur. Students learn to "grapple" with text by emulating the teacher's questioning techniques.

Reciprocal Teaching

Reciprocal Teaching is the name for a teaching procedure that is best described as a dialogue between the teacher and students. "Reciprocal" means simply that each person involved in the dialogue acts in response to the others. The dialogue focuses on a segment of a text the group is reading and is structured by the use of four comprehension strategies:

asking questions,

clarifying difficult words and ideas,

summarizing what has been read, and

predicting what might come next.

The teacher first models and explains how to apply a comprehension strategy, then gradually turns over the activity to the students. As the students become more competent, the teacher requires their participation at increasingly more challenging levels.

Reciprocal Teaching provides students with opportunities to observe the value of applying strategies in their "real" reading. In addition, it allows the teacher to identify problems individual students might have in using strategies and to provide instruction that is geared to individual needs.

Transactional Strategy Instruction

Transactional Strategy Instruction (TSI) is a procedure that involves teaching students to construct meaning as they read by emulating good readers' use of comprehension strategies.

TSI helps students (1) set goals and plan for reading, (2) use background knowledge and text cues to construct meaning during reading, (3) monitor comprehension, (4) solve problems encountered during reading, and (5) evaluate progress. To accomplish these tasks, students are taught to use a set of reading strategies. The strategies typically include:

predicting based on prior-knowledge activation,

generating and asking questions,

clarifying,

visualizing,

relating background knowledge to text content, and

summarizing.

Instruction occurs in small-group settings, with the strategies used as vehicles to coordinate dialogue about text as students read aloud. In their groups, students are encouraged to relate a text to their background knowledge, to summarize text, to describe any mental images they make during reading, and to predict what might happen next in the text. As students read aloud, they engage in and exchange individual interpretations of and responses to the reading.

The I-Chart Procedure

The I-Chart Procedure is a technique that promotes critical thinking by encouraging students to apply reading strategies to learn from content-area texts.

The procedure is organized into three phases: Planning, Interacting, Integrating and Evaluating. Students begin the Planning phase by using content-area texts to identify a topic of study. They then generate questions they want to answer as they read. Next, they construct a large chart, similar to the following, on which to record information as they gather it. They complete the Planning phase by collecting materials about the topic.

Teacher Questions and Student Questions

In the Interacting phase, students record their background knowledge of the topic, as well as other information they might gather. In addition, the teacher elicits and records relevant student questions. Finally, the students read and discuss, with teacher guidance, the sources of information.

In the final phase, Integrating and Evaluating, students make summaries for each question on the chart, incorporating information they have gathered. Next, they compare their summaries with background knowledge, clarify statements as necessary, and discuss new knowledge they have acquired. Finally, they locate new information to address any unanswered questions and report their findings to the group.

In this procedure, the teacher directs and models the phases of the procedure. Gradually, however, the teacher releases responsibility for managing the procedure to students. The goal is for the reader to satisfactorily apply these comprehension strategies independently.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
To correspond with a typical reading lesson, comprehension strategy instruction can be organized into a three-part framework, with specific activities used before, during, and after reading. Providing instruction such as the following example allows students to see, learn, and use a variety of comprehension strategies as they read.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
How to Teach Children to Use Their Schema for Reading Comprehension!

# data[].attributes.body
Ping Pong, Partner Reading, Write Arounds

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Teaching Reading and Comprehension to English Learners, Grades K-5

# data[].attributes.body
Check for understanding as students "pal read"

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Pal Reading: Developing Fluency and Comprehension with Paired Reading

# data[].attributes.body
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDSwvFL3mdQ

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.entities[].name
Reading Strategies for Struggling Middle School

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.entities[].name
Powerful Method for Teaching Reading to Classroom of Students

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Games for Students to Help Build Comprehension : Teaching With Games

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Subscribe Now: http://www.youtube.com/subscription_center?add_user=Ehow Watch More: http://www.youtube.com/Ehow Certain games are great for helping your students build upon their existing reading comprehension. Find out about games for students to help build comprehension with help from an experienced teacher in this free video clip.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
At school, we teach children reading strategies that will help them to read unfamiliar words. Please support these lessons in your reading at home.

When you come to a word you do not know:

Say blank and read on to the end of the sentence, paragraph, thought, or page.

Reread - go back to the beginning of the sentence and try the sentence and word again.

Try to figure it out, "What would make sense in that spot?"

Look at the beginning/ending sounds, blends, prefixes, suffixes, vowels, root words, little words found in the big words to help identify the word.

Ask yourself, what would sound right in that spot.

Use picture clues to help identify the word.

Make predictions about the story as you read.

Ask yourself what you already know about the story.

You may print this hand out as a reading aid for your child. The hand may be cut out and used while reading. The child should refer to the hand when s/he encounters words that are unknown. Use the strategies mentioned above or on the hand below instead of telling the child the unknown word.

You could also use a gardening glove for this strategy. Write the words on the glove and use the glove while reading.

You may print this hand out as a reading aid for your child. The child should refer to the hand when discussing the story. While retelling about a story, movie, or the days events, the child should include the 5 W's: Who, What, Where, When, Why. Use as many details as possible. A gardening glove works well.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
At school, we teach children reading strategies that will help them to read unfamiliar words. Please support these lessons in your reading at home. When you come to a word you do not know: Say blank and read on to the end of the sentence, paragraph, thought, or page.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Good readers need to be able to recall and make sense of, or comprehend, what they read. One of the best ways to increase comprehension in readers of any age is with the Questioning Strategy. In order to better understand the text kids learn how to create teacher-like questions about what they have read. Sounds simple, right? All it takes is practice!

This is where the Question Ball comes in!
How to use a Question Ball to increase reading comprehension:

1. Read a story together just as you normally would-make predictions, read with inflection, ask questions, discuss thoughts, etc.

2. Bring out the Question Ball and let the kids look at it. Talk about the question words written on it.

3. Play catch! Whoever catches the ball gets to ask the question using the question word that his/her left thumb lands on.

4. Answer the question and throw it back.

Don't worry if at first all of the questions the child asks are very low level or ones you may have already said-it takes a lot of practice to be able to create good teacher-like questions. New readers greatly benefit from having good reading models and in this case will be able to improve their questioning skills by watching you develop your teacher-like questions.

Younger readers can use the Question Ball too. Little ones who may not be quite ready to start making up questions can play question ball catch to choose question words for you to use to ask them questions about the story you have read aloud. This is a great way to learn about question words and to to build a sight word vocabulary.

Becoming a good reader and developing comprehension skills is a cumulative process that takes place over many, many years. A Question Ball won't increase reading comprehension overnight, but it will make learning the questioning strategy more fun!
Ready to make your own Question Ball?
It couldn't be easier!

1. Buy a cheap beach ball.

2. Blow it up and set it on a bowl.

3. Write a question word in each section.

4. Let dry and get ready to play!

I made these for a bunch of my friends and I used 3D puffy paint to write the words for an extra sensory effect. They are really cool and my 2 year old loves to trace the letters and the question mark, but it was hard to write the words neatly. If that will bother you you may want to stick to markers.

What fun reading games do you use to help increase comprehension skills?

Linking up to:

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Practice Questioning with a Question Ball

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Good readers need to be able to recall and make sense of, or comprehend, what they read. One of the best ways to increase comprehension in readers of any age is with the Questioning Strategy.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Our principal has really been encouraging us to add more writing into our daily lesson plans. "They should be writing all day long" he tells us. The research is there to back him up.

I bumped into this I
Roll and Retell page from Fun In First on printed and laminated four copies of the Roll and Retell page to hand out to each of my four table groups. Pinterest awhile back and finally figured out how to add it to our learning day.

After a round of Daily 5 I handed them out. I also gave each table one die. Each student at the table took turns rolling the die and then answering the question based on the number they rolled. They each used the individual book they were reading to answer the questions. I felt like it would be a great advertisement for new books for each child to read when they were done with the one they were working on. I also knew it would be great oral practice BEFORE they started writing.

Once they had a chance to talk about what they were going to write, I set the timer for 5 minutes and let them write. Then we shared our responses.

Here are a few of their responses.

I had so much success with this activity with my students, that I created versions that cover the standards for
2nd, 3rd and 4th grades.

What have you tried in your classroom lately? Link up with
Dr. Susan Hall, literacy leader and founder of 95 Percent Group, mentions this Roll and Retell Activity as a Reading Comprehension Game that Students Will Want to Play Over and Over! Check it out for the other ideas there as well!

Fourth Grade Flipper for Tried It Tuesday and share!

This post contains affiliate links. I earn a small commission each time someone makes a purchase using one of my links, which helps to support the blog. All opinions are my own and I only promote brands and products that I have used myself and truly love.

I would love to hear from you! ❤️

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Roll and Retell - Building Summarizing, Communication, and Writing Skills

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Our principal has really been encouraging us to add more writing into our daily lesson plans. "They should be writing all day long" he tells us. The research is there to back him up.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Reading Comprehension

Reading. It's a very simple word, but a very complex process. Its internal nature is what makes it so complicated. You can't physically observe what is going on in another person's head; so, as a reading teacher, how do you assess for reading comprehension?

Let's first look at each of those terms. Reading comprehension refers to a student's ability to understand the meaning of a text. Thus, student assessment for reading refers to the evaluation of an individual's ability to understand text. Some believe a reading teacher can ask simple recall questions to see if a student has understood what was read. However, true reading comprehension goes far beyond simple recall.

So with all this in mind, what are some ways to assess your students' reading skills?

Predict

The first technique is to work on your students' ability to predict, which means to make an educated guess about what might happen. Effective predictions must make sense within the context of the reading.

Start with making predictions before reading the text. Have students decipher the possible meanings of titles and subtitles. Examine any pictures or images and connect those to the titles. If there are graphs, have students try to explain what the graph might mean. Putting all this information together, students can guess at what might happen in the text.

Furthermore, do not only use predictions before the reading. In order to assess whether students understand text, stop at certain points throughout the reading to make predictions. Have students use the knowledge already learned about the characters and story elements to predict what will happen next. Lastly, return to all predictions after the selection is finished to see who was correct. How accurate and thoughtful your students' predictions are allows you to assess reading comprehension.

Identify

The second reading skill to use for assessment is identify, which means to indicate important elements of a reading. Two examples of those elements are the author's purpose, which is the reason for writing, and the themes, or the messages in the selection.

Identifying the author's purpose can help you evaluate how well a student understands the overall goal of the text. Texts are written for many reasons, but those reasons are rarely explicit. If your students can identify the author's purpose, it shows a deeper understanding of the text. The same is true for the themes. One way to assess for themes is to ask your students to state what lessons can be learned from the reading. Have them use details from the story to support their answers. Identifying the author's purpose and major themes will tell you if they are processing the important story elements in the text.

Visualize

Visualization, the next skill to assess, means to see in one's mind all the details from the story. Helping students connect the written words with actual visible scenes is very important to understanding the content. First, help students organize the details in their minds. Reread written sections that are very descriptive. Ask students to think about the descriptive words and relate them to actual things they have seen.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.keywords[]
assessment techniques for reading comprehension - video & lesson transcript | study.com

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Assessment Techniques for Reading Comprehension - Video & Lesson Transcript | Study.com

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Reading. It's a very simple word, but a very complex process. Its internal nature is what makes it so complicated. You can't physically observe what is going on in another person's head; so, as a reading teacher, how do you assess for reading comprehension?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Note: This article originally appeared in ASCD Express: Vol. 5, Issue 11, " Reading to Learn."

Comprehension is the reason for reading, but it can be the most difficult skill to master - especially for English language learners (ELLs). ELLs often have problems learning science, math, or social studies concepts, for example, because they cannot comprehend the textbooks for these subjects.

ELLs at all levels of English proficiency and literacy development will benefit from improved comprehension skills, which allow them to:

read more accurately

follow a text or story more closely

identify important events and concepts in a text

master new concepts in their content-area classes

complete assignments and assessments

feel motivated to read in school and for pleasure

There are a number of ways to build ELLs' comprehension skills. Often standard strategies that are used in mainstream classrooms are a good starting point - they just need to be tweaked with ELLs' language and academic needs in mind! This article focuses on strategies that are part of three main approaches: building background knowledge, teaching vocabulary explicitly, and checking comprehension frequently.

I. Build background knowledge

Draw on students' existing knowledge

Students may already possess content knowledge that they cannot yet demonstrate in English. Look for opportunities to make associations between students' experiences and new content. Allow students to use their native language with peers for a quick brainstorm about what they know about a topic before presenting their ideas to the whole class.

Build students' background knowledge

Students with limited or interrupted schooling may not have that same level of knowledge as their peers, especially when it comes to historical or cultural topics. When starting a new lesson, look for references that may need to be explicitly explained.

Take students on a "tour of the text"

At the beginning of the year and each time you hand out a new textbook, take students on a "virtual tour." Show them different elements of the text, such as the table of contents and the glossary, and discuss how these sections can be helpful. Explain how the text is organized, pointing out bold print, chapter headings, and chapter summaries. Once students learn how to recognize these elements, they will be able to preview the text independently. Remember that students need to know how to use a tool in order for it to be useful. Learn more about this strategy in Teaching ELLs to Navigate Textbooks Effectively.

Use a "picture-walk"

This strategy can be used for fiction or non-fiction books. "Walk through" the book with the students, pointing out pictures, illustrations, and other graphic elements. Ask them what they notice about the pictures and how they think those details may be related to the story or content.

Use outlines to scaffold comprehension

Provide a brief, simple outline of a reading assignment or an oral discussion in advance of a new lesson. This will help ELLs pick out the important information as they listen or read.

II. Teach vocabulary explicitly

Focus on key vocabulary

Choose vocabulary that your students need to know in order to support their reading development and content-area learning. Provide student-friendly definitions for key vocabulary.

Include signal and directional words

Remember that students may also need explicit instruction in signal or directional words ("because" and "explain"), in addition to key content vocabulary ("photosynthesis" and "revolution").

Use a "picture-walk" for vocabulary

Once students know a new word's definition, ask them connect those new words to the pictures they see in the text.

Teach students to actively engage with vocabulary

Teach students to underline, highlight, make notes, and list unknown vocabulary words as they read.

Give student practice with new words

Ensure that your students can:

Define a word

Recognize when to use that word

Understand multiple meanings (such as the word "party")

Decode and spell that word

Incorporate new words into discussions and activities

For students to really know a word, they must use it - or they will lose it. Use new words in class discussions or outside of class in other contexts if appropriate, such as on field trips. Give the students as many opportunities to use and master the new vocabulary as possible.

III. Check comprehension frequently

Use informal comprehension checks

To test students' ability to sequence material, for example, print sentences from a section of the text on paper strips, mix the strips, and have students put them in order.

Test comprehension with student-friendly questions

After reading, test students' comprehension with carefully crafted questions, using simple sentences and key vocabulary from the text. These questions can be at the:

Literal level (Why do the leaves turn red and yellow in the fall?)

Interpretive level (Why do you think it needs water?)

Applied level (How much water are you going to give it? Why?)

No matter what the proficiency level of the student, ask questions that require higher-level thinking

To probe for true comprehension, ask questions that require students to analyze, interpret, or explain what they have read, such as:

What ideas can you add to...?

Do you agree? Why or why not?

What might happen if...?

How do you think she felt...?

Use graphic organizers

Graphic organizers allow ELLs to organize information and ideas efficiently without using a lot of language. Different types include Venn diagrams, K-W-L charts, story maps, cause-and-effect charts, and timelines.

Provide students lots of different ways to "show what they know"

Drawings, graphs, oral interviews, posters, and portfolios are just a few ways that students can demonstrate understanding as they are beginning to develop their reading and writing skills in English.

Summarize

Ask students to use the following strategies to summarize what they have read (orally or in writing):

Retell what you read, but keep it short.

Include only important information.

Leave out less important details.

Use key words from the text.

It may be challenging to get ELLs' comprehension skills where you want them to be, but the extra effort it takes will be well worth it as you put them on the path to becoming successful readers.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Reading Comprehension Strategies for English Language Learners

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Note: This article originally appeared in ASCD Express: Vol. 5, Issue 11, " Reading to Learn." Comprehension is the reason for reading, but it can be the most difficult skill to master - especially for English language learners (ELLs). ELLs often have problems learning science, math, or social studies concepts, for example, because they cannot comprehend the textbooks for these subjects.