Teach Comprehension

In chapter 8, Reading Essential, the author stressed the importance of teaching comprehension right from the start.  For example, she discussed how in the earlier grades, teachers focus on automaticity, word calling, and fluency.  By do this, students are more focused on trying to pronounce words when reading text rather than thinking about comprehending the text.  Also, she explained how as teachers we assess student’s comprehension skills.  However, we fail to   teach them how to think critically when they read.  The author stated, “Most students can give us the rudimentary facts but rarely an analysis of what they’ve read.  We are turning out lots of superficial readers.  They look and sound competent.  They read smoothly and can retell what they’ve read with some detail, but they are unable to go further-to discuss why characters behave as they do, to give a concise summary, to discuss the theme or big ideas, to talk about the author’s purpose.”

                Routman explained the importance of teachers teaching skills and strategies to help students with their comprehension.  She provided a list of strategies that proficient readers use when they are reading.  For example, proficient readers, make connections, monitor your reading for meaning, determine what’s most important, visualize, ask questions, visualize, make inferences, and synthesize. 

                The author stressed the importance of being careful about how we teach comprehension.  She talked about how teachers read books to learn strategies for teaching reading.  Often times, teachers take strategies they learn too far. Therefore, students are exposed to many strategies, but they are not sure as to how to apply them.  She stated, “So much emphasis on comprehension strategies can actually make reading harder.” 

                Routman expressed how teachers should balance explicit instruction with time allotted for application.  She stated, “We need to be careful, too, about the amount of time we’re devoting to strategy instruction the act of reading still needs to predominate.  Many students are held back by too much explicit instruction and too little guided practice.  Keep in mind a 20-percent to 80-percent rule.”

                At the end of the chapter, Routman provided strategies teacher can use for teaching comprehension.  For example, teach rereading s the single most useful strategy, use writing to help recall key points, teach students to survey text before they begin to read, teach self-monitoring as crucial to understand, and many more.