Comprehension

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Comprehension

• The Ability to Construct Meaning and Understand
  Ideas
• Pam Jones Literacy Consultant
• COP ESD

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Mosaic of ThoughtEllin Oliver Keene and Susan
Zimmermann

• It is teachers who create the environment and
  give students the tools they need to read deeply
  and thoughtfully, so that they can contemplate
  ideas alone and with others and write
  persuasively about what they read. It is
  teachers who embrace the wide range of responses
  their students give to the same text, and
  challenge the students to read books they believe
  they cannot.

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A Framework of Literate BehaviorsStrategic
Comprehension (Ciera, 1998) Every Child a Reader

• Independent Stage
• Identifies specific words that are impeding
  comprehension
• Summarizes major points in informational text and
  stories
• Discusses themes
• Asks how, why and what-if questions
• Distinguishes between cause/effect, fact/opinion
• and ideas/details in informational text

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Comprehension Strategies

• Strategies That Work
• Stephanie Harvey and Anne Goudvis
• Mosaic of Thought
• Ellin Keene and Susan Zimmerman
• I Read It But, I Dont Get It
• Cris Tovani

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Making Connections Between Prior Knowledge and
Text

• Students comprehend better when they are able to
  relate what they read to another aspect in their
  lives or the world in general.
• Readers store newly learned information with
  other related memories( Pearson et al. 1992).
• Good readers know when their background knowledge
  for a topic is inadequate and how to build it.

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Asking Questions

• Questioning while reading keeps the level of
  engagement active. It gives the reader incentive
  to forge ahead to make meaning.
• Proficient readers ask questions of themselves
  and of the authors as they read, to clarify, make
  predictions, focus their attntion and locate
  specific answers.

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Evoking Sensory Images (Visualizing)

• Active readers create pictures in their minds as
  they read. These pictures enhance and further
  understanding through visual, auditory and other
  sensory connections to the text.
• Active readers immerse themselves in rich detail.
• Active readers revise their images to incorporate
  new information.

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Drawing Inferences

• Inferring is the intersection of taking what is
  known and combining it with clues from the text
  to speculate what is to come, to make critical
  judgments or to form unique interpretations.

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Determining Important Ideas

• Readers must differentiate between key ideas and
  less important ideas determining which are
  central to the meaning of the story.
• Readers utilize text structure and special
  features in expository text to help determine
  importance.

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Synthesizing Information

• Synthesizing involves combining new information
  with existing knowledge to form a new
  interpretation or a new insight.
• Synthesizing can clarify or change a readers
  thinking.
• A new idea is formed much the same as a jigsaw
  puzzle moves toward completion piece by piece.
• Good readers extend their synthesis of the
  literal meaning to the inferential level.

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Repairing Understanding

• If confusion disrupts understanding, readers may
  need to go back and select appropriate strategies
  to unlock the meaning.
• They may need to skip ahead, reread, use syntax,
  semantics or grapho-phonic cues to solve a given
  problem.
• Good readers ask themselves
• Does this make sense?
• Does this word sound like language?
• Have I seen this word before or one similar?
• What do I already know from the context of this
  text that will help me?

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Retelling

• Instructional Focus
• How do we teach children to recognize the
  elements of a story without distracting them or
  obscuring their view of the text with technical
  terminology?
• From The Art of Teaching Reading
• By Lucy Calkins

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Go! Charts Developmental Retelling ( The
following slides have been adapted from The Power
of Retelling, 2000.)

• Go! Charts facilitate the move from
  literal-level comprehension to higher order
  thinking and interaction with the text.

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Shape GO! Map
Characters
Setting
Beginning
Problem
Events
Middle
Resolution
End
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The Heart of Retelling
Predictions
Vocabulary
Understandings
Interpretations
I noticed in the story.
I wonder why.
This is what I Think the story Will be about
I think the author may use these Words
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The Heart of Retelling (cont.)
Connections
Retelling
This reminds me of.. Because.
I will use this story map to help Me retell the
story..
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Reading For Immersion
Schema established or confirmed
Retelling for Comprehension
Schema accessed
Responding For Extension
Schema extended
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Retelling Informational Text

• What is the topic?
• What are the most important ideas you remember?
• What new information did you learn?
• What is the setting for this information?
• What did you notice about organization and text
  structure that helped you?
• What was the authors purpose for writing this
  article?

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The Great Aha! InReading Comprehension

• Goal is to access students depth of
  understanding and thematic connections across
  texts.
• Framework for Understanding
• Reader is aware primarily only of the physical
  actions of the characters.
• Reader is aware of the physical and intellectual
  actions of the characters.
• Reader is aware of the physical and intellectual
  actions of characters in light of an ethical code.

Adapted from Eileen Sargent, Helen Huus, Oliver
Andresen
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Question Stems Related to a Framework for
Understanding for Narrative Text

• Physical
• What happened to.? Where did?
• When did.? Who did? How did?
• Mental
• Why did?
• Moral
• Is it okay? Is it ever wrong to?
• Was she right to?
• Do you agree or disagree with the characters
  actions?

Generated by the work of Jeff Beal et.al from
Macomb RLTC based on the Profundity Scale
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Question Stems Related to a Framework for
Understanding

• Psychological
• Were there other reasons he acted like that?
• If you were in her shoes would you have done the
  same thing?
• How else could the problem have been solved?
• Philosophical
• What is the abstract truth that can be derived
  from this text?
• What did you learn that you can generalize to
  other text or your life?
• What is the big idea that you can use to help
  yourself?

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Comprehension Strategy Instruction Using
Informational Text

• Adapted from
• Profundity R Us
• Elaine Weber and Jeff Beal

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Why Use Informational Text?

• Factual texts
• Provide information about the real world
• Can stimulate inquiry
• Set purpose for reading and writing
• Promote purposeful conversations
• Increase text repertoires

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Comprehending Nonfiction

• Good Readers
• Use prior knowledge to make sense
• Ask questions before, during and after
• Determine whats important
• Monitor comprehension throughout
• Make inferences during and after
• Synthesize information
• Visualize key ideas while reading
• Can summarize what they learned

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Promoting Inquiry in the Classroom

• Discuss real issues, events and people
• Use Think Aloud with your own questions when
  reading aloud
• Have students use sticky notes to Code when the
  read, ex.(?-question, I-important, L-learned
  something new, V-vocabulary,-important, Aha-
  big idea surfaces, !!!-exciting).
• Create a burning questions board to use as a
  starting point for inquiry response

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Literal PlaneWhat information does the author
tell me?

• What I already know about this topic
• Title of the selection
• The details I remember after reading
• Important words or phrases

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Summary PlaneWhat are the authors important
ideas?

• List three major ideas
• List supporting details under each major idea.
• Write a short summary of the text.

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Schema Plane

• How does this fit with what I already know?
• This makes me think
• I wonder why
• I didnt know

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Concept Plane

• What is the concept?
• Give examples of what it is.
• Give examples of what it is not.
• This reminds me of another text, because.
• Classify, categorize, compare, and/or contrast.

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Universal Plane

• What is the universal principle you learned from
  this information.
• How did this new information change the way you
  think?
• What should I think or do with this information?
• How can you apply this principle to another
  situation?