When and How Should Comprehension Be Taught?

Reading comprehension has been a popular topic for me these past few weeks. My students expressed concern about when they can address reading comprehension in their instruction. Between phonics and phonological and phonemic awareness instruction and interactive read-alouds, they are struggling to fit in direct and explicit comprehension instruction. In addition to my students expressing concern for teaching comprehension, I have heard from parents who are concerned that their children are not understanding the texts that they are reading. So, this leads me to ask and consider when does comprehension instruction take place and how should it be taught?

What is the Purpose of Reading?

Another way to word this question is why do we read? I asked this question to my 7-year old daughter a few weeks ago and her response was that we read to decode words. It is correct that we decode words when we read, but we read to understand or to learn something. For example, I just finished Oliver Burkeman’s latest book Meditation for Mortals and I did not pick up the book to decode the words that Oliver put into the book. I read the book because I wanted to learn about how Oliver broke his ideas about time, productivity, and being an imperfectionist down into doable strategies. That’s the reason I read the book - to learn more about this topic from Oliver’s perspective.

I brought this question up to my students and they were not sure how the kids in their classrooms would respond to this question. I suggested that they may want to ask their students this question and then discuss why we read. Setting the purpose for reading a particular book is helpful for kids (and, adults!).

Teaching Comprehension Through Minilessons

When I started teaching, comprehension strategies were taught through minilessons. A strategy was introduced to the students in a concise manner and the teacher was responsible for modeling how to use the strategy when reading a text. The kids were invited to try-out the strategy with the teacher using the text that the teacher was using for the lesson. After the lesson finished, the kids went off to read independently and were asked to try out the strategy in their independent reading book.

This type of instruction has not been as prominent in the classroom since the increased popularity of Science of Reading. But, I will argue that in addition to direct phonics and phonological/phonemic awareness instruction, kids need direct instruction on comprehension strategies. Otherwise, why are we teaching all of these decoding strategies if the purpose of reading and learning to decode is to understand what we are reading?

Teaching Comprehension Through Grade-Level Texts

Decodable texts are widely used in elementary classrooms at the moment. And, they serve a purpose. But, these are more controlled texts and often there is not a lot of higher-level thinking that kids can do with decodable books. There is also an argument that grade level books need to be used with all students so that they have access to the skills, standards, and texts that are expected for that grade level.

One idea that I have been thinking about is using grade-level texts as the tool and the space to teach direct and explicit comprehension strategies. For example, if you are teaching 4th grade and want your students to read Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing by Judy Blume, you can use this book to model and teach how you are implementing the different strategies that you are introducing to the students. You can read the book in a variety of different ways with the students as well. You can read the book aloud to the students - and include the comprehension strategy work into your teaching, you can have the students re-read the chapter after you read it aloud. They can do this independently or as paired reading with a partner. You can put the students into groups and have them read the chapter. You can also read the book in a combination of a read-aloud and choral reading. There are many options for reading the text (that do not involve popcorn reading!), but here are the two pieces that are required: a strategy should be taught (directly) before beginning the reading and the students need to try-out the strategy and complete some type of work that requires them to demonstrate how they attempted the strategy. They need a deliverable!

Connecting Strategy Instruction to Independent Reading

I am seeing a lot of independent reading in classrooms. But, the kids are being asked to “read for 20 minutes” or “read for 30 minutes” without any purpose. This is wasted time and is not effective. What will likely happen is that many of the kids will simply stare at the pages in the book and will not actually read for that length of time.

How can this be made more effective? Set a purpose for independent reading. You can have the students try-out a particular strategy that you already taught while they are reading independently. Again, they should complete some type of work (it can be writing on a post-it or in their reading notebook) to show that they attempted the strategy and were thinking about the book while reading it.

Another thing to consider is the length of time you are asking kids to read independently. 20 and 30 minutes is a long time for kids to be reading independently and be engaged on their own. For kids in the primary grades, you are building their attention and reading stamina, so starting with 5-10 minutes is more realistic. For the upper elementary grades, starting with 10-15 minutes and building on this is more reasonable.

Considering Where to Include Comprehension Instruction

Take a look at your reading instruction and consider how you can include more reading comprehension instruction into your day. I know, there is so much to cover, but this is the heart of teaching reading and what will hopefully keep the kids engaged and interested in reading.