Comprehension

After working with two great groups of readers this year, I tried to focus on several skills that they were struggling with.  One of the areas we worked on heavily was the skill of comprehension.  Comprehending what we read can be tricky for struggling readers because if the passage is too hard or they struggle to decode the words they are reading then comprehension is lost or difficult for them. 

So here are some tips that I used to help my readers practice the skill of comprehending what they read. 

1.  Short passages

Some of my readers were first graders reading on a kindergarten reading level.  We began reading short passages that had a lot of high frequency words easily recognized and short simple stories that helped them remember what they were reading about. 

2.  Picture Walks

Before we began any type of reading we would walk through a text full of colorful illustrations that depicted the story.  This helped ease any fears of not knowing what the story was about.  This also helped them recall some facts or things they knew prior to reading. 

3.  Visualize, Visualize, Visualize

I recently read a great article and a tip on how to make the skill of comprehension a little easier.  This is a great read.  During my reading sessions with my little readers we would stop during the story and visualize what the story was doing.  We would also visualize for a moment or infer what might happen next. Click on the picture to read this article from The Struggling Homeschooler. 

4.  Teach several strategies

Another great resource I found was this chart found at wiki-teacher.com.  I plan on printing out this chart on cardstock and laminating them for my reading groups. I love this chart because the pictures will help my littlest emerging readers and give them a visual reminder of skills we will be working on when we need to comprehend what we are reading.   

Over the summer, I uploaded a packet that I used with my students this year to help with comprehension.  I created this because I often struggled finding short , easy to read passages, for my students to read and answer questions.  Head on over to my TpT store to get a free sample of it with 3 stories to use and then you can purchase the bigger packet with 20 more stories. 

Want to get the pack on sale????  Teachers Pay Teachers is having their huge Back to School Sale starting August 4-5th.  My store will be on sale along with additional savings from TpT.  Thanks to Scooting through Second for the cute banner!  Love it!