Comprehension Strategies
How to Teach Reading Lesson Plans: Comprehension Strategies.
Uses comprehension strategies to get information from a wide range of materials
1) Utilizes prior knowledge
Have the students create journals. Maintain journals in electronic student portfolio.
Give students an opportunity to share relevant personal experiences.
2) Identifies analogies
Have the students complete an analogy puzzle.
Example:
shoe: foot glove: (hand)
boy: man girl: (woman)
nose: smell tongue: (taste)
boat: water truck: (road)
juice: glass coffee: (cup)
doctor: patient teacher: (student)
run: track swim: (pool)
leaf: tree feather: (bird)
Illustrate at least five (5) analogies. Use a computer graphics/drawing tool to illustrate analogies. .
3) Utilizes visual aids to completely understand the passage (e. g., picture, list, table, chart, graph)
Use sources such as science/social studies textbooks, Weekly Reader, newspapers, and the Internet to model reading and interpretation of visuals through guided questions, such as:
1. What kind of information can we find from this visual aid?
2. What would be an appropriate title for this graphic?
3. How can you use this information?
4. Why was this information presented in graphic form instead of narrative?
Have students create a story map after silently reading a passage. Use a brainstorming/mapping tool that organizes and diagrams information to create the story map. .
Have the students interpret charts, tables, graphs, or a list to respond to questions related to a story.
Give students a list of questions to answer using visual aids to get information.
Have students identify map symbols and locations on a map.
4) Identifies and applies knowledge of organizational patterns (e.g., cause and effect, compare/contrast, sequence)
Have the students create a cause and effect statement using examples from their own experience (e.g., I brought a sweater today because it was cool).
Have the students create a Venn diagram from information found in two similar recipes.
Have the students use a Venn diagram to contrast a book with its movie version (e.g., The Secret Garden, Where the Red Fern Grows).
Have the students compare and contrast different authors/illustrators. Use online resources to locate information about authors/illustrators. Use presentation tools to compare/contrast authors/illustrators.
Have the students compare and contrast characters in a story.
Have students compare and contrast themselves at their current age with their parents at that same age.
Have the students compare and contrast different genres.
Have the students compare information in articles written by two different news groups about the same event using online resources.
Have the students use online stories to identify cause and effect relationships and sequencing. See Technology Resource Guide for online resources.
5) Locates, summarizes, and combines information from different sources
Have students locate information for a given theme using multiple sources including electronic/online resources. and online resources.
Give students a reading text and science text and have students locate, summarize, and combine information on a specific topic (e.g., story on birds and scientific article on birds). Use electronic/online resources to gather information and create presentations about a specific topic.
Have the students read a story. Choose one word in the story and rewrite it from a first person perspective.
Have the students read a newspaper article. Make a list of important facts. Use electronic/online resources to locate news articles and a writing/publishing tool to make a list of the important facts.
Read historical facts and have students take notes.
6) Identifies and makes inferences
Read a story. Have the students make a mask that demonstrates how a character feels during a particular event of the story.
7) Skims and scans to locate key information
Have students skim a selection for specific information.
Give students a list of questions to answer by skimming or scanning the table of contents or index.
Have the students skim or scan a telephone book to find specific numbers (emergency, businesses, government agencies, etc.).
Create a scavenger hunt from web site topics that are interesting to students.
8) Retells stories
Have students retell story using an audiotape.
Have students retell story using story prompts.
Have students dramatize the story.
Have students listen to oral reading of story and then retell story (oral/written intervention for whole group). Retelling should include the following concepts:
Concepts of Comprehension include:
1. Specific details
2. Relevant content
3. General details
Concepts of Metacognitive Awareness include:
1. Connection of background knowledge
2. Summarizes text and connects to real life
Concepts of Language Development include:
1. Controls use of mechanics of speaking and writing (vocabulary, sentence structure, language conventions)
2. Organizes details and structures composition
9) Utilizes parts of a book (e.g., table of contents, glossary, index, title page, headings and captions)
Have students find specific information using the table of contents and or index.
Have students define a list of words using the glossary.
Have students identify the location of specific information.
10) Identifies story elements (e.g., character, setting, plot, theme, mood/tone, conflict, and solution)
Have students read a story and identify and discuss the story elements.
Find an article from a news web site or a story from an online resource and identify and discuss story elements.
Utilize a story board to identify story elements.
Example:
Setting PlaceTime ˆWhen and where? Characters Who or Whom? Problems or Conflict Goal Why?
Sequence of happenings
11) Rereads to determine meaning
Have students reread incorporating the SQ3R method (survey, question, read, recite, review).
Adjust the reading rate according to the purpose (e.g., social studies/science need to be read more slowly using study skills such as noting, captions, bold-faced type).
12) Identifies and summarizes main idea and supporting details
Teach the students how to identify the subject of the passage by asking the question “Who or what is the passage about?”
Have the students identify the details by asking the students “What has the author said about the subject?”
Have the students retell the passage or write a summary. Use a writing/publishing tool to write and to illustrate the summary and exchange via e-mail with other students. .
Tape record students retelling the story.
Use electronic/online resources to obtain articles or stories to summarize.
13) Makes predictions, draws conclusions and infers meaning
Have students draw conclusions from information cues (e.g., The batter consistently missed the ball. [He strikes out]).
Use story titles from a basal reader and have students make predictions, inferences, and draw conclusions.
Give the beginning portion of a comic strip and have students create an ending.
Have students make predictions after only reading the title.
Have students make predictions after looking at the pictures/illustrations.
Have students make predictions after reading beginning paragraphs.
Have students verify and evaluate their predictions.
Have students identify important word clues within a story and integrate that information with their prior knowledge and experience.
Use a writing/publishing tool to keep an electronic journal of the above activities.
14) Identifies and uses variety of resource texts (e.g., encyclopedia, dictionary, thesaurus)
Have the students use electronic/online resources to locate information from guided reading activities.
Have the students use an atlas to identify interstate and intrastate roadways. Discuss global positioning systems with students. Compare online mapping site with printed map.
Have the students use a dictionary to fill in information chart for a list of specified words.
Entry Word Re-spelling Number of Definitions Part of Speech
Use electronic/online resources to research a given topic and create a presentation. See Technology Resource Guide for suggested activity, software, and online resources.
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