Reading comprehension can be a problem for many
children and adults, not just those with specific learning disabilities. The process of reading written words and
making meaning out of them is not something that just comes easily for
everybody. However, there are things
that you as a parent or teacher can do to help your child, your student, or
even yourself be a better comprehending reader.
The study of reading comprehension is complex and
involves many areas of expertise. There
are beginning strategies and advanced strategies depending on the type of
reading one is doing. So for this post,
which I’d like to keep simple, I’m just going to share some basic ideas and use
the terms “your child” which you can substitute as your student or yourself as
fits.
- Model
reading comprehension to your child:
Regardless of what age your child is, read aloud something
together. As you read, stop to show your
child your cognitive processes while reading.
Example 1:
You read: “Johnny
ran down to the beach to retrieve the towel he left there. On his way, he stumbled over a large rock and
fell in the sand. His wet body felt
scratchy covered with the harsh sand.”
You stop and say aloud: “Oh poor Johnny. That must have hurt. Do you remember when we went to the beach and
you fell in the sand?” Allow for a small
discussion if necessary, but not too long that you lose focus on the
story. The purpose of this dialogue is
to show your child how you have pictured yourself in that situation and
empathized with Johnny. You asked the
child to recall an instance from his/her past to help your child empathize with
the character. This is all you want and
then direct the child back to reading the story by saying something like, “I
wonder what Johnny is going to do now” and start reading again.
Example 2:
You read: “The thirty children were divided into
three equal teams and told to work together on their scavenger hunt. Maya found it difficult to concentrate on
what her team speaker was saying to find as the other children were being too
noisy. She wished she could have been on
a smaller team.”
You stop and say aloud: “Hmm, if there were thirty
children divided into three teams, that meant Maya’s team had ten children on
it. Wow! That is a lot of children on
one team. What do you think? Would you like to be on a scavenger hunt team
with nine other children?” Then you can briefly discuss what some of the problems
of being on such a large team might be.
This way you are showing how you are processing what you read, asking
questions to yourself about what it means and what it would feel like, and
predicting what might happen next by thinking about Maya’s dilemma. Again, keep
it brief and move back to the reading as soon as possible so as not to lose
focus on the reading itself. You could segue
back by saying something like, “Let’s see if Maya has some of those problems
with her big team.”
(As you can see, it helps if you have read the book
ahead of time too so you can better help your child focus on the issues of that
particular book, but it is okay if you don’t and you make mistakes such as
focusing on something – like maybe Maya’s big team problem – and then finding
out that really wasn’t that important in the story. This just shows your child how these things
happen and it is okay; you model how you refocus as the story shifts.)
Example 3:
Make mistakes and show your child how you correct
them. Read something too fast and then
stop saying something like, “Wait a minute.
I just read that so fast that I don’t know what I read. Let me slow down and read that again.”
Read something and then stop and say, “I’m
confused. I thought Margaret and Dinah
didn’t like each other but here they are being friends. What just happened?” If your child knows the
answer, let him/her tell you. If not,
suggest that you go back and reread the last paragraph or sentence or as much
as you think you need to find the answer.
Show your child how you do this.
Model a distraction and how to deal with it. While reading if some noise is made nearby or the dog comes and jumps in your lap, or anything that might be a distraction
happens, keep reading and then stop and say, “You know, I was reading the words
but I really wasn’t paying attention.
When Fido came and jumped up in my lap, my brain started to think about
Fido and even though I was reading, I didn’t really pay attention to what I was
reading. Does that ever happen to you?”
Then you show how you go back and reread what you didn’t pay attention to.
- Show
your child how to use visualizing techniques while reading. This can be picturing in your head the scene
or event you are reading. It can be
drawing the scene or event. It can be acting out the scene or event.
Example 1:
You read a story about a little brown dog who got lost and
then saw his family across the street but had to get across the street safely
to get to them. You and your child draw
a picture of the street with the little brown dog on one side and his family on
the other side.
Example 2:
You read the story of the three little pigs and the big bad
wolf who blows their houses down. You
and your child take turns pretending to be the pig or the wolf and act out the
drama.
Example 3:
You are reading a history textbook about a civil war battle. You tell your child to stop and imagine what
that might have been like. You tell your
child to close his/her eyes and you describe the scene: “Imagine you are in a
field with your friends beside you.
There is so much smoke in the air from the guns firing that it is hard
to see in front of you. You hear someone
crying, but you don’t know who it is.
What would that be like? Tell me
what you see? What you feel? What you
hear?” Try to get your child to imagine
and describe a scene to you.
Example 4:
If you are reading a story that has a movie to go with it,
watch the movie first. Most teachers do
it the opposite way and watch the movie only after reading the story (which has
its own value as the student can use more of his/her own imagination in
picturing the events if she/he hasn’t watched the movie first) but for a child
with comprehension issues, watching the story first can help give a frame of
reference to the reading and make it more comprehensible. Then while reading, have your child recall
back to the movie what they remember seeing during that event.
- Show
your child how to summarize and put into his/her own words what has been read.
This can be either oral or written, depending on the needs or style of your
child. If memory recall is an issue,
writing or recording the summary is important to have it to return to later
when the recall is needed.
Example:
Your child is reading a chapter book. Your child can comprehend a paragraph pretty
well, but has trouble synthesizing the paragraphs in a chapter to form a
complete summary or cannot recall the information gleaned from the earlier
paragraphs by the time she/he has reached the end of the chapter.
After each paragraph read in the chapter, have your child
say, dictate, or write one sentence summarizing what the paragraph is
about: Was a new character introduced? Did
something happen to a character? Did it describe the scene? Was a solution to a
problem found? Was a new problem
introduced? Etc.
Then after the child has gotten to the end of the chapter,
the child can look back over the sentences he/she has created for each of the
paragraphs to remember what was important about each paragraph. This should give a general outline of the
important events of that chapter and the child can use that to write a short
paragraph to summarize that entire chapter.
After each chapter read, the child can look back at the
previous summaries of each chapter she/he has created before reading the next
chapter to remember what has happened so far, recall important events and
facts, make predictions of what might happen in the upcoming chapter, etc.
(If your child cannot summarize a paragraph, then go back to
the sentence level. Read one sentence
and have the child put into his/her own words what that sentence was
about. I wouldn’t have the child write
for each sentence as that will get frustrating, so just paraphrase it orally
and write a sentence at the end of the paragraph.)
(If your child finds every paragraph to be too much writing
and doesn’t need that for recall, just paraphrase and write at the end of each
chapter. If your child needs that for
memory recall but can’t handle the writing, then let him/her dictate to you or
record it.)
So as I look back over what I wrote here and how really long
this post has become, I at the same time realize that this is just the tip of
the iceberg in terms of strategies for reading comprehension. There are so many more and some that are very
good and specific to different genres of writing such as the structure of poems,
the form of an argumentative article, the plot of a fictional story. Still, they are a start and hopefully offer
some help to others struggling with reading comprehension.
Also, one very important thing I want to add is that these
strategies can be used for comprehending movies too. This can be especially helpful for a child
who really has anxiety about reading, as the comprehension of the movie can be
a start to using those same strategies with reading too.
Oh and the big, number one, best thing to do ever is: Make it fun to read! Enjoy reading with your child and spread that enthusiasm to your child. (And from my own personal experience with my kids, I've found that my oldest son prefers non-fiction or creepy stories and my youngest son prefers fiction - especially involving animals. My daughter likes graphic novels best, and then anything with romance and happy endings. So find what your child enjoys to read.)
If you are really interested in learning more about reading comprehension, here are some books you might be interested in:
For weeks Hailey had looked forward to going to a concert with her two closest and dearest friends. As we were going to see the Go-Gos and the B-52s, the girls all bought 1980s prom style clothes and fixed their hair up with 1980s styles (Hailey had a side pony tail.) Us moms sat behind them in seats close to the stage, so we could all see very well. However, the NOISE was incredibly loud!
Hailey's thoughts: 
