READING: THE ABCs of helping youngsters achieve literacy--the first skill. : Reading by 9 : Head of the Class / READING TIPS AND NOTES : EXPERT ADVICE : Editor’s note: This is the second of two columns focusing on ways to improve reading comprehension for young readers.
Picture this: You have a deadline for reading an important business report or a textbook chapter. You tackle the task, prepared to use your time productively. After a few minutes, however, you realize that while reading, you’ve been thinking about a dozen other things--making a mental grocery list, finalizing weekend plans, contemplating a talk you need to have with your boss.
Though you’ve been “reading,” perhaps even highlighting phrases, you realize you’ve comprehended very little, if anything.
Sound familiar?
Research clearly indicates that comprehension requires an interactive, thoughtful and reflective reader. Proficient readers use a variety of thinking strategies, including using background knowledge and experiences, to understand what they are reading.
Two other important strategies, evaluating and summarizing, have also been identified as essential for effective comprehension.
These strategies enable readers to identify the main idea, understand the role of supporting details, articulate cause-and-effect relationships, and compare and contrast information. Effective readers use these comprehension skills in a flexible, integrated way. For example, in order to summarize an article, a reader must determine the overall idea and relevant details. In order to evaluate importance, the reader may need to compare and contrast varying positions or events.
Parents and teachers can support developing readers in their use of comprehension strategies in the following ways:
* Together, read a short and interesting newspaper or magazine article, section by section. Explain how you decide what the most important points are in the first section and summarize in a sentence or two what you think is the overall main idea.
* Read through the next section and then ask your child to give it a try. Throughout, “think aloud” about your own comprehension processes and be supportive of your child’s responses. When watching television together, during a commercial break talk about the most important event in the previous segment. See if your child can summarize in one sentence what happened, including the main characters, setting and sequence of events.
* Using a highlighter marker, show the child how to find key words, topic sentences and other important parts of a story. When reading together, talk about how you know something is important.
* Use the marker to highlight 10 to 12 key words in a passage of about 100 words. List them on a piece of paper and together try to use them in a sentence or two that summarizes the passage. Repeat this process for another section, showing how to determine importance and how to summarize. Remember that reading should be pleasurable, so select interesting articles, keep your practice sessions brief and be patient with your child’s developing skills.
*
BOOK EVENTS
* Monday in Boyle Heights: Puppet club, reading and writing puppet show scripts, 6:30 p.m., Robert Louis Stevenson Library, 803 Spence St. (323) 268-4710.
* Tuesday in Pasadena: Story time, Dr. Seuss stories, 10 a.m., Barnes & Noble bookstore, 111 W. Colorado Blvd. (626) 585-0362.
* Friday in the Crenshaw district: Book program for grandparents and children, 10 a.m. to noon, Hyde Park Branch Library, 6527 Crenshaw Blvd. (323) 750-7241.
