Reading comprehension involves a number of critical thinking skills that are used alone, in combinations or simultaneously. The best way to practice and apply these skills is through real reading situations where students can discuss and share their thoughts and opinions as well as predict, infer, question, summarize and evaluate what they have read.
Selecting Stories
Teachers should select stories that they know the children and, as well as the teachers themselves, will enjoy. Include stories from several genres to show how reading strategies can be applied in a variety of texts. When teaching reading comprehension skills, it will be easier if a teacher has several books available that demonstrate each skill instead of trying to teach many skills from one story.
Read-Alouds
Read-alouds are essential, especially for students in grades K through 2. Teachers use the read-aloud procedure to model reading comprehension to their class. Stories that are descriptive and action-filled make great read aloud material. These type stories are also conducive to interaction, in which the teacher pauses reading to give students time to talk to each other about the plot, setting and characters.
Questioning
Questioning is a comprehension skill that is done before, during and after reading a story. Students can scan the story and look at pictures or read the information printed on the back of a book in order to make connections with any prior knowledge they may have. These activities generate interest in a story. While reading, students can jot down questions they may have about a word or character and discuss them later in class. After reading, students summarize and evaluate the story by retelling and checking predictions.
Story Titles for Predicting Practice
The Internet has a variety of resources to help parents and teachers choose stories that reinforce reading comprehension(see References and Resources). The following are stories for applying and reinforcing the skill of predicting for students in grades K through 4: "The Frog Prince" by Jon Scieszka, "Dog Breath" by Dav Pilkey and "Too Many Tamales" by Gary Soto.
Story Titles for Summarizing and Evaluating
Summarizing and evaluating are important skills because they help students be able to remember what they read and use what they have learned when reading other books. The following titles specifically help build these two skills in grades K through 4: "Owl Moon" by Jane Yolen, "Rosa" by Nikki Giovanni and "Pop's Bridge" by Eve Bunting.
