Title: Promoting Reading Comprehension in K1 Classrooms: A Focus on Skills and Strategies
1Promoting Reading Comprehension in K-1
Classrooms A Focus on Skills and Strategies
- Presented by
- Lana Edwards Santoro, Ph.D.
- 2nd Annual National Reading First Conference
- New Orleans, Louisiana
- July 26-28, 2005
2Agenda
- What is comprehension? What does the research
say? - What reading comprehension skills and strategies
should kindergarten and first grade children
know? - What factors that influence student
comprehension? - Fluency
- Vocabulary
- Text Structure
- Self-Monitoring
3Agenda
- What to Teach and How to Teach How do you put it
all together? - Before
- During
- After
- Conclusions and Discussion
4The concurrence principle implies more than the
temporal concurrence of the mens rea and actus
reus. The relationship between the two parts of
the crime must be deeper the impelling force or
motivation behind the act that causes the social
harm must have been the mens rea of the offense
and not some other thought process such as the
mental state of preparing to commit the
offense. (Dressler, J., 1987, p. 172)
- Why is it important that both motivational
concurrence and temporal concurrence exist? - (2) Explain why motivational concurrence cannot
be found simply by looking at the act itself.
5What Does Proficient Comprehension Look Like?
- Literal Comprehension
- Sequencing
- Summarizing
- Making Connections and Inferences
- Applying Critical Evaluation
6What is Comprehension?
- Comprehension is the complex cognitive process
involving the intentional interaction between
reader and text to extract or construct meaning.
(National Reading Panel, 2000) - Reading comprehension is not an automatic or
passive process, but is highly purposeful and
interactive good readers apply a variety of
strategies to process text. - (Honig, Diamond, Gutlohn, 2000)
7What the Research Says About Comprehension
- What the Research Says about Comprehension
- Time spent reading is highly correlated with
comprehension - Effective instruction using high-quality
curriculum materials can increase students
comprehension - Comprehension instruction can begin before
students read independently through read aloud
opportunities.
8Comprehension Strategies Supported by Research
- Reader Strategies
- Previewing/Predicting
- Making connections
- Monitoring and Clarifying
- Question generation
- Summarization
- Teacher Strategies
- Question asking/answering
- Cooperative learning
- Graphic/semantic organizers/story maps
National Reading Panel (2000)
9The Relationship Between Skills and Strategies
Preview/Predict Summarize Monitor/Clarify Evalua
te Generate Questions
STRATEGIES
Sequence
Skills
Drawing Conclusions
Main Idea
Noting Details
(Chard Kameenui, 2003)
10The Skill-Strategy Connection
- Strategies are generally more complex than skills
because they require the orchestration of several
skills. - Effective instruction links comprehension skills
to strategies to promote strategic reading.
(Chard Kameenui, 2003)
11Skills-Strategy Example
- To SUMMARIZE involves
- Sequencing of events
- Making judgments
- Noting details
- Making generalizations
- Using story structure or text organization
(Chard Kameenui, 2003)
12Activity
- In terms of comprehension, what should children
know? - By the end of kindergarten?
- By the end of first grade?
13Instructional Priorities Kindergarten
- Reads familiar texts emergently, i.e., not
necessarily verbatim from the print alone. - Uses new vocabulary and grammatical
constructions in own speech. - Notices when simple sentences fail to make
sense. - Connects information and events in texts to life
and life to text experiences. - Retells, reenacts, or dramatizes stories or
parts of stories. - Can name some book titles and authors.
- Correctly answers questions about stories read
aloud. - Makes predictions based on illustrations in the
story.
National Research Council (1998)
14Instructional Priorities First Grade
- Reads aloud with accuracy and comprehension any
text that is appropriately designed for the first
half of grade 1. - Monitors own reading and self-corrects when an
incorrectly identified word does not fit with
cues provided by the letters in the word or the
context surrounding the word. - Reads and comprehends both fiction and
nonfiction that is appropriate designed for grade
level. - Shows evidence of expanding language repertory,
including increasing appropriate use of standard
and more formal language exercises. - Notices when difficulties are encountered in
understanding text.
National Research Council (1998)
15Instructional Priorities First Grade -continued
- Predicts and justifies what will happen next in
stories. - Discusses prior knowledge of topics in
expository text. - Discusses how, why, and what-if questions in
sharing nonfiction texts. - Describes new information gained from texts in
own words. - Distinguishes whether simple sentences are
incomplete or fail to make sense notices when
texts fail to make sense.
16Why do Children Have Trouble with Reading
Comprehension?
(1) Word Recognition/Reading Fluency -
Approximately 90 words per minute in grade
level text (See grade level benchmarks) - No
more than 1 error every 10 words (2)
Vocabulary (3) Failure to Use Text Structure to
Facilitate Comprehension (4) Failure to Monitor
Comprehension - Stop. Do I understand what I
just read? - Teach fix up strategies reread,
read ahead, adjust pace
17- Factors that Influence Comprehension
- Fluency
- Vocabulary
- Text Structure
- Self Monitoring
18Fluency
19Comprehension/Fluency Relationship
If a reader has to spend too much time and
energy figuring out what the words are, she will
be unable to concentrate on what the words mean.
(Coyne, Kameenui, Simmons, 2001) Slow,
effortful reading is a labor-intensive process
that only fitfully results in understanding.
(National Reading Panel, 2000)
20How Do Children Become Automatic with Word
Reading?
- Read a word successfully 4-14 times.
- Store the letter-sound correspondences and
retrieve them. - Read and reread large amounts of text.
- Read at their independent reading level (95).
1997 Comprehensive Reading Leadership Programs
(AB 3482)
21What happens if students are not fluent
readers????
22Example
- Read the following paragraph and answer
- these comprehension questions.
- Does Fern love Wilbur? How do you know?
- Describe what Fern does when she feeds Wilbur in
the morning. - What does Fern do when the school bus comes in
the afternoon? - Why does Mrs. Arable feed Wilbur?
23Fern _____ ______ more than ______. She _____ to
_____ him, to ____ him, to put him to _____.
Every ______, as soon as she got up, she _______
his ____, ____ his ____ on, and held the _____
for him. Every ____, when the _____ ____stopped
in ____ of her house, she ______ out and ran to
the ______ to ____ another _____ for him. She
_____ him again at _______, and again just ____
going to _____. Mrs. _____ gave him a _____
around _____ each day, ______ Fern was ____ in
______.
70
(E. B. White, 1952)
24Fern _____ Wilbur more than ______. She _____ to
_____ him, to ____ him, to put him to bed. Every
______, as soon as she got up, she _______ his
____, tied his ____ on, and held the _____ for
him. Every ____, when the _____ ____stopped in
front of her house, she jumped out and ran to the
______ to fix another _____ for him. She _____
him again at _______, and again just before going
to bed. Mrs. Arable gave him a _____ around _____
each day, when Fern was ____ in ______.
80
(E. B. White, 1952)
25Fern _____ Wilbur more than anything. She loved
to stroke him, to ____ him, to put him to bed.
Every ______, as soon as she got up, she _______
his milk, tied his ____ on, and held the bottle
for him. Every afternoon, when the school
____stopped in front of her house, she jumped out
and ran to the ______ to fix another _____ for
him. She fed him again at _______, and again just
before going to bed. Mrs. Arable gave him a _____
around noontime each day, when Fern was away in
______.
90
(E. B. White, 1952)
26Fern _____ Wilbur more than anything. She loved
to stroke him, to feed him, to put him to bed.
Every morning, as soon as she got up, she _______
his milk, tied his bib on, and held the bottle
for him. Every afternoon, when the school
____stopped in front of her house, she jumped out
and ran to the ______ to fix another bottle for
him. She fed him again at _______, and again just
before going to bed. Mrs. Arable gave him a
feeding around noontime each day, when Fern was
away in school.
95
(E. B. White, 1952)
27Point to Remember
Fluency is not an end in itself but a critical
gateway to comprehension. Fluent reading frees
resources to process meaning.
28Vocabulary
29What the research says
- The relationship between reading comprehension
and vocabulary knowledge is strong and
unequivocal (Baumann Kameenui, 1991
Stanovich, 1986). - Even weak readers vocabulary knowledge is
strongly correlated with the amount of reading
they do (Cunningham Stanovich, 1998).
30Vocabulary Knowledge
What is it? . . . Learning, as a language based
activity, is fundamentally and profoundly
dependent on vocabulary knowledge. Learners must
have access to the meanings of words that
teachers, or their surrogates (e.g., other
adults, books, films, etc.), use to guide them
into contemplating known concepts in novel ways
(i.e., to learn something new). (Baker,
Simmons, Kameenui, 1998)
31What is it?
- Receptive Vocabulary requires a reader or
listener to associate aspecific meaning with a
given label as in readingor listening. - Examples
- Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-Revised (PPVT-R)
- Does equal mean
- The same
- Not the same
- Better
32What is it?
- Expressive Vocabulary requires a speaker or
writer to produce a specific label for a
particular meaning. - Examples
- Expressive One-Word Picture Vocabulary Test
- What does equal mean?
33What is it?
- Deep Processing
- Making more connections between new and unknown
information (or relating the word to more
information that the student already knows) - Spending more of ones mental effort on
learning. - Methods which make students think deeply about
a word and its relationships are more likely to
be effective. (Stahl, 1986)
34Why Vocabulary Instruction Fails
- Most vocabulary instruction fails to
- provide in-depth word knowledge
- Research suggests that reading comprehension
requires a high level of word knowledge higher
than the level achieved by many types of
vocabulary instruction.
(Nagy, 1988)
35Vocabulary Instruction
- Vocabulary instruction should include
- Intensive study of some words involving multiple
exposures in a range of meaningful contexts - Direct teaching and modeling
- Opportunities to use new vocabulary in
discussions about books and related activities
36Text Structure
37Text Structure
- . . .students who are knowledgeable about and/or
follow the authors structure in their attempts
to recall a text remember more than those who do
not. Second, more good than poor readers follow
the authors text structure in their attempt to
recall a text (Pearson Fielding, 1991, p. 827).
38Text Structure
- Awareness of text structure is linked to reading
comprehension (National Reading Panel, 2000) - Generally taught during grade 3 or later
- Early grades may be an ideal time to teach story
elements because of childrens interest in and
informal understanding regarding stories
39Two Kinds of Organizational Text Structure
40Narrative Text Structure
-
- Story structure underlies the organization of
the text (e.g., character clues, plot, setting,
conflict, etc.) - Recounts personal experience based on something
which really happened or might have happened - All details work together in an integrated way
to create a complete story with beginning,
development, turning point, resolution
41Critical Features
- Main Character
- Something About the Character Character Clues
- What Happened First
- What Happened Next, Next, etc.
- How Did the Story End?
- Discuss Change in Character
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44Information Text Structure
- Many structures (e.g., sequence,
compare/contrast, problem/solution). - Gives information, explains, clarifies, defines.
- Teaches, reveals, informs, or amplifies the
readers understanding.
45What are some types of organizational frames?
- Descriptive
- Enumerative
- Cause/Effect
- Compare/Contrast
- Problem/Solution
- Reaction
- K-W-L with common questions
- What you think you KNOW
- What you WANT to Learn
- What you LEARNED
46K-W-L
What You Think You Know
What You Want to Know
What You Learned
47Curriculum Example
- K-W-L with common sets of questions
- General Animals
- What is a reptile? (What makes a reptile a
reptile?) - What are some types of reptiles?
- Specific Animals
- What does it look like?
- What does it eat?
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50Monitoring Comprehension
51Metacognitive Strategies
- Effective readers engage in metacognitive
strategies before, during, and after reading to
improve comprehension -
- During reading, teach students to self-monitor
their comprehension by asking themselves
periodically whether what they are reading makes
sense (Paris et al., 1986Schunk et al., 1985)
52Metacognitive Strategies
- Effective readers remember more if they ask
themselves questions during reading (Wong
Jones). - Teach students to ask themselves why they are
reading the material, find the main idea, think
of questions about the content and search for
answers, and then look back on both the questions
and answers to decide how each provided more
information about the content.
53Curriculum Example
- Teacher think alouds are used to model
self-monitoring. - We just read that the bear was slumbering. Im
not sure what slumbering means. Lets re-read
this page to see if we can figure out what
slumbering means.
54Curriculum Example
- Teacher retellings
- Im going to retell the story Bear Snores On.
Teacher models retell Did I include all the
story information in my retell?
55Curriculum Example
- Student Retellings with Partners
- Listeners, think about whether your partner said
everything he or she was supposed to. If they
included the book type, topic, and information
about what makes an animal a mammal AND what
types of animals are mammals, tell them they did
a good job. If your partner didnt say one or
more of those things, you need to tell him or her
they should do so next time.
56- Putting it All Together Components of Effective
Comprehension Instruction - Before Reading Strategies
- During Reading Strategies
- After Reading Strategies
57General Framework for Teaching Comprehension
Before Reading
During Reading
AfterReading
- Set objectives for instruction
- Identify and preteach difficult to read words
- Prime students background knowledge
- Chunk text
- Stop periodically to ask students questions
- Map text structure
- Model ongoing comprehension monitoring
- Strategic integration of comprehension
instruction - Planned review
- Assessment of students understanding
58Scaffold Your Teaching
- Model
- Lead/Guide
- Work collaboratively with students and the
strategy, giving and taking as much as necessary
to create meaning - Eventually, students take on more and more
responsibility - Students use strategies independently
(Pardo, 2004)
59Curriculum example Scope and Sequence
- Pre-Unit
- Teach students about routines and materials
- Units 1 3
- Teacher demonstrates and models strategies
- More teacher Think Alouds are used
- Explicit instructional support
- Units 4 6
- Teacher guides and facilitates
- Units 7 9
- Teacher elicits
- Increased use of inferential questions
60Before Reading
- Identifying the purpose for reading
- Informational text or story
- Previewing
- title, author, illustrator
- Strategic predicting/priming background knowledge
- Defining critical vocabulary
61Application Activity
In August, Henry and Henry's big dog Mudge always
went camping. They went with Henry's parents.
Henry's mother had been a Camp Fire Girl, so she
knew all about camping. She knew how to set up a
tent. She knew how to build a campfire. She knew
how to cook camp food.
Report shows Oregon doing well on "highly
qualified" teacher requirements EUGENE, Ore.
(AP) -- More than 80 percent of Oregon students
last spring were being taught by teachers who
meet the federal government's new definition of
"highly qualified," according to a new report by
the Oregon Department of Education.
62Application Activity
Examine the two text examples from the previous
slide
- How are these two text examples different?
- ______________________________________
- How might an expert reader approach
comprehending these two text examples
differently? - ______________________________________
63Explicit Steps and Strategies
Curriculum example Setting a Purpose for
Reading Example Tell students that it is
important to know what kind of book you are
reading before you begin. Explain that we read
stories differently than we read informational
books. Say We are going to learn to figure out
why we are reading a book before we begin to
read. For example, if we are reading The Grouchy
Ladybug, we know that it is a story about a
ladybug who is grouchy like a person. But if we
are reading a book about real ladybugs, we would
read to learn new ideas about ladybugs as insects
who are not like people.
64During Reading
- Using consistent framework (e.g., story elements,
info. headings, info. text focus questions) - Question-asking strategies
- Literal
- Organizational
- Inferential
- Making connections (Text to text, text to self,
text to world) - Active Thinking (Predict-Proof)
- Self-monitoring (What do you do when you dont
understand something?) - Vocabulary
65Text-Focused Discourse
- Discourse guides students to understand text at a
more sophisticated level (Wilkinson Silliman,
2000) - Builds on ideas and promotes meaningful
connections between ideas (Gersten et al., 2001) - Can clarify and substantiate students
understandings of concepts, vocabulary ideas
(Pressley McCormick, 1995) - Not commonly used in elementary grades (Pressley
et al., 1998)
66What we knowInteractive Dialogue
- Requires a child to step back and reflect on the
storyline or the language in the story. - Students must become part of the teacher-student
dialogue by actively contributing or attending. - Leads to deep processing, repetition, and
additional connections.
(Beck, McKeown, Hamilton, Kucan, 1997
Whitehurst et al., 1994)
67Teachers Ask Effective Questions
- Questions progress from literal (or explicit) to
more complex (or implicit) - Always remember your instructional purpose and
learners skill levels! - Questions should elicit more than a simple yes or
no response - Ask students opinion or feelings
68Continuum of Questions
Â
(Adapted from Anderson Krathwohl, 2001)
69Activity Developing Different Question Types
- Develop the following question types for Mary
Had a Little Lamb - Remember
- Understand
- Apply
- Analyze
- Evaluate
- Create
70Mary Had a Little Lamb
- Mary had a little lamb,
- Its fleece was white as snow.
- Everywhere that Mary went,
- The lamb was sure to go.
- It followed her to school one day,
- Which was against the rules.
- It made the children laugh and play,
- To see a lamb at school.
71Students Ask Effective Questions
- Ask students to. . .
- Elaborate what they are thinking or feeling about
an event or character in a story, and - Connect what is in the story to their real lives
- Different levels of questions can help students
increase their comprehension of texts that are
read aloud and those that are read independently.
72Activity Question Cards
- Use question cue cards to facilitate the use of
question asking to promote comprehension. - Narrative Cards
- Information Cards
73Model Multiple Examples
Curriculum example Making Connections
I am six. I am six. We are six. We are all six.
Here is our class. Here is our teacher. Here is
our school. (Text accompanied by photos of
students in their classroom doing various
activities). I Am Six by Ann Morris
Example Model how to predict what is going to
happen based on the title or section of
text. Say When I am in school, I read and
draw. I think these children will too.
74Model Multiple Examples
Curriculum example Making Connections
Our snake, our hamster, our mouse, all live at
school. I Am Six by Ann Morris
Example Provide subsequent models of making
connections. Say These children have pets in
their classroom just like we do. Lets think of
the pets that we have. We also have a snake and
we have a guinea pig.
75Model Multiple Examples
Curriculum example Making Connections
We read. We write. We count. We sing. We paint.
We play every day. I Am Six by Ann Morris
Example Provide subsequent models of making
connections. Say We also do all of those
things. I especially like to paint in school. It
is my favorite thing.
76Predict and Prove Active Reading with a Purpose
Prediction
Prove
77Questions for Observation
- What do you predict will happen text?
- Was your prediction accurate?
- If your prediction wasnt accurate, how did you
revise it?
78After Reading
- Structured Retelling (Fuchs et al., 1994)
- Retell of storybooks
- Retell of information text (review with KWL chart
and tell with information retell sheet) - Summarizing
- Vocabulary Review and Extension Activities
- Vocabulary Introduction and Preview
79After Reading
- Reaction Frames
- Childs attention is focused on how
- his/her ideas were revised due to the
- acquisition of new information (helps
- revise preconceived ideas).
- Question-Answering
80Provide Opportunities to Practice
Curriculum example Retelling
After teaching how to retell a short story and
after modeling periodic summarizing of the story
using a simple story structure such as main
character, problem, solution, and end, do the
following
Example Read aloud from Butterfly Boy by
Virginia Kroll. Stop at intervals and ask
students to tell the most important parts of the
story Write these on the board. Then have
students work in pairs to identify the beginning,
middle, and end of the fable. They can record
their findings on a story grammar page.
81Retelling
82Retelling
83Provide Opportunities to Practice
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85Student Book Clubs
Retelling
- Rank order students.
- Split the rank ordered list into the top and
bottom halves. - Pair the top ranked student in the upper half
with the top ranked student in the lower half
(i.e., 1 with 13 if class has 26 students). - Pair the next two students according to the above
procedures - These 4 students will be Book Group 1.
- Adjust pairings according to personality
issues. - Modified from Hasbrouck, 1998.
86Book Clubs Partners
Retelling
- Establish guidelines and a routine
- Limit the amount of time book clubs talk (e.g., 2
minutes with reminders to take turns at 30 sec.,
60 sec., etc.) - Behavior expectations are ESSENTIAL!
87Vocabulary
Post-Reading Encourage Interactions with Words
- Same Format (Yes/No/How do you Know?)
- Would there be a trapeze in the library?
- Is it fabulous if you fall and scrape your knee?
- Could you cut scallops in paper?
- Could you twirl your hair?
- Would you knead soup?
- Would you recognize your teacher?
- Could you twirl on a trapeze?
- Is the masterpiece fabulous?
- Does a bulb have scallops?
(Beck, McKeown, Kucan, 2002)
88Vocabulary
Post-Reading Encourage Interactions with Words
- Questions, Reasons, Examples
- If you are walking around a dark room, you need
to do it cautiously. Why? What are some other
things that need to be done cautiously? - What is something you could do to try to impress
your teacher? Why? - Which one of these things might be
extraordinary? Why or why not? - A shirt that is comfortable, or a shirt that
washed itself? - A person who has a library card, or a person who
has read all the books in the library?
(Beck, McKeown, Kucan, 2002)
89Vocabulary
Post-Reading Encourage Interactions with Words
- Making Choices
- If any of the things I say would make someone
look radiant, say Youd be radiant. If not,
dont say anything. - Winning a million dollars.
- Getting a hug from a favorite movie star.
- Walking to the post office.
- Ill say some things, if they sound leisurely,
say Leisurely. If youd need to be in a hurry,
say Hurry. - Taking a walk in the park.
- Firefighters getting to a fire.
- Runners in a race.
(Beck, McKeown, Kucan, 2002)
90Vocabulary
Post-Reading Encourage Interactions with Words
- Relating Words
- Sentences
- Would you prefer to budge a sleeping lamb or a
ferocious lion? - Choices
- If you get your clothes ready to wear to school
before you got to sleep, would that be sensible
or raucous? - If you and your friends were watching a funny TV
show together and began to laugh a lot, would you
sound pounce or raucous?
(Beck, McKeown, Kucan, 2002)
91Tips
- Ideally, you want to have retell/summary and
vocabulary practice everyday. - . . .Provide daily practice for every child!
92Reaction Frames
93Reaction Frames
94Activity Describe features and activities in the
sample lesson
- Before Reading
- During Reading
- After Reading
95Conclusions
96Structure Ample Review
Review needs to be sufficient, distributed across
time, cumulative, and varied
- After students have learned individual
strategies, teachers should have them apply
strategies to a wide range of texts. For example,
once students have learned how to retell simple
stories, engage them at retelling more
sophisticated selections as well as informational
books. By providing ample review, students will
learn to independently determine how, when, and
why to use retell.
97Extension Activities
- Extension activities for vocabulary words
- Re-Reading the text a 2nd or 3rd time
- Reading unread parts of the information text
- Web-based activities and information seeking
- Writing using retell or summary sheets
- Compare and Contrast across texts
- Thematic connections, other book recommendations,
activities, etc. - Any other ideas?
98School-Home Connection
- Send student story and information retell sheets
home - Ask students to retell a story or talk about an
information book with a family member - Ask students to find out one new fact about a
particular topic - Ask parents to share a fact about a particular
comprehension theme or topic - Any other ideas?
99More Considerations. . .
- Texts used for comprehension instruction should
be chosen carefully - (e.g., type, content, skill level, pictures,
organization) - Instruction should progress from easy skills to
difficult skills - (e.g., narrative to expository, literal to
inferential questions, simple to complex story
maps) - Strategies should be introduced and practiced one
at a time - Graphic organizers can support student
understanding - For students with low decoding skills,
comprehension strategies can be taught through
oral language activities - (e.g., read alouds)
100Conclusions
- Word Recognition/Fluency/Automaticity
- Metacognitive, Self-Monitoring Strategies
- Explicit Instruction of Before, During, and
After Reading Comprehension Strategies
- Active, engaging, rich dialogic interactions
about text
101One Last Thing. . .
Reading Decoding X Comprehension
102Any Questions?
- Lana Edwards Santoro, Ph.D.
- P. O. Box 30380
- Alexandria, VA 22310
- (703) 971-0310 /office
- lana_at_educationassociates.org
- www.educationassociates.org