Amy Hansen Blog Post 7--Chapter 8: Teach Comprehension

Teaching comprehension and strategies are an essential part to teaching reading. Again Routman notes the importance for us as teachers to demonstrate our thinking we when teach to show our students how to apply these strategies. It is something I never considered to show my students, but it is something I am more aware and strive to do when I read aloud with my students.

I am also focusing more on the strategies that Routman mentions we should be teaching to help our students comprehend: making connections, visualizing, making predictions/inferences, asking questions, monitoring reading for meaning, and synthesizing especially with our Guiding Readers Units we have this year. Each week, we read the same book, but we focus on a different comprehension strategy every day. I know Routman suggests to be careful teaching these strategies one at a time though. When we read our story throughout the week though, I always make it point to continue discussing what we predict, visualize, infer, or make connections throughout the week. I've noticed my students remember,too, when we continue to discuss it over and over again. With this new reading units, too, I've noticed that students especially now since we've used these strategies all year are learning and know what it means when I ask them or tell them that we are going to visualize or predict or infer. My hope is that they will remember these strategies as they continue into the older grades so they can continue to gain meaning and understanding from their reading.

Not only are we working on those strategies in whole group, we have also started working on them in small guided reading groups. This helps me to see and for my students to practice applying strategies I teach during whole group. We've just now gotten away from a box program (Read Well) which was only teaching students to read fluently, but wasn't always teaching comprehension. As a grade level, we continued to use it, but it always bothered me especially when it came time to benchmark test my students and there was no comprehension to test them on. I am very thankful that we now have access to Reading A-Z.com. Yes, I know it's a program and yes I realize the texts are leveled which are things Routman asks us to consider when teaching reading. It does however allow great practice with previewing text, making connections, and other comprehension strategies that are so important to beginning reading experiences. We do focus on phonics, sight words, and phonemic awareness as well, but so far, I have seen great results in just the few weeks we've been using these books. A lot of what we used to teaching in LEAP LAB/PRIDE are things that I am seeing again now through reading Routman's book and through our discussions in class. I think with more practice this year through my small groups and continued practice in whole groups, I hope to enrich my students through reading and comprehension so they will be ready for success in first grade.