Comprehension Strategies for Narrative and Informational Text

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Comprehension Strategies for Narrative and
Informational Text

• Dr. Kevin Flanigan
• West Chester University
• kflanigan_at_wcupa.edu

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Transactional Comprehension Strategies
Instruction(Pressley, 1998)

• Dynamic give and take between teachers and
  students
• Coordinated and flexible use of multiple
  strategies in the throes of reading
• Meaning constructed among teachers and students
  as they consider text content in light of
  previous knowledge/experiences.

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Transactional Comprehension Strategies
Instruction(Pressley, 1998)

• Teacher explanation and modeling of strategies
• Scaffolded student practice over time (small
  group reading instruction)
• Internalization of strategies

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Transactional Comprehension Strategies
Instruction(Pressley, 1998)

• TSI students outperformed controls on
  standardized measures of comprehension and
  interpretive measures
• (Anderson, 1992 Brown et al., 1996 Collins,
  1991)

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DRTA(Directed Reading/Thinking Activity)

• Purpose to develop young scholars who are
  actively engaged in critical thinking and
  decision-making during reading
• Coined and developed by Russell Stauffer
• Comprehension as hypothesis-testing

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DRTA

• Teacher selects approximately 3 stopping points
• During these stopping points, teacher facilitates
  discussion through questioning
• Three types of questions
• Prediction
• Confirmation
• Exploration

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DRTA

• Prediction Questions
• What do you think is going to happen next?
• Why do you think so?
• What have you read that supports your prediction?

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DRTA

• Confirmation Questions
• Were you close?
• Exploration Questions
• Did he love her?
• Has any character changed?
• What does this tell you about this character?
• What is this story mostly about right now?

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DRTA

• Steady and faithful use of the DR-TA will develop
  your students into young scholars
• The teachers role is one of agitator
• Stir up the discussion and move in or back out
  as needed
• It should look and feel more like a discussion
  rather than a formal lesson

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Strategies/Thinking Processes

• Predicting
• Confirming/Modifying Predictions
• Clarifying
• Summarizing
• Making inferences
• Justifying
• Responding to text based on prior knowledge

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Power Thinking (Santa, Havens, Valdes, 2004)

• Purpose to provide students a framework for
  organizing information that is hierarchical in
  nature
• Main ideas, subtopics, details
• An alternative to roman numeral outlining

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Power Thinking

• Power 1 Main Ideas
• Power 2 Subtopics
• Power 3 Details

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Power Thinking

• Power Mapping use with a graphic organizer
• Power Reading use in conjunction with reading
• Power Writing use as a framework for organizing
  essays, reports, etc.

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Power Mapping

• Introduce this strategy with something the
  students know well (movies, fast food)
• Use shapes and/or colors consistently to
  differentiate power 1, 2, and 3 ideas
• Before reading, have students create power 1 and
  2s as a previewing technique

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Pattern Puzzles/Concept Sorts

• Take any set of concepts, vocabulary words,
  sentences, story events, and mix them up!
• Students must reorganize them.
• Promotes understanding of the pieces and how
  the pieces relate to each other the
  structure.

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Selected Resources

• Pressley, M. (1998). Reading instruction that
  works The case for balanced teaching. New York
  The Guilford Press.
• Santa, C. M., Havens, L. T., Valdes, B. J.
  (2004). Project CRISS Creating independence
  through student-owned strategies.
• Stauffer, R. G. (1975). Directing the
  reading-thinking process. New York Harper Row.