The readings this week also made me think about my own comprehension and how I use the comprehension strategies when I read for school and pleasure. I bring my background knowledge to every text I read. When its a book for pleasure I might bring background knowledge about an event in my life, or another book I read by the same author, or another book in the same genre. When it is a text for class I might bring background knowledge from another article about a similar topic, or my experiences in the classroom at MSU or an elementary school. I make connections between the text and myself, other texts, and the world when I am reading for pleasure and school. The connections I make for school are more frequently to other texts to help me gain a greater understanding of what I am reading. When I am reading for pleasure I make connections in many different ways. I determine the purpose for reading before beginning any text. When I am reading for pleasure the purpose is almost always for entertainment, though it is occasionally to learn something new. The purpose for reading most texts for school is to learn something new, gain a greater understanding of a topic, or prepare for a class discussion. I make conscious and unconscious inference while I am reading all kinds of text by connecting my background knowledge to the author's writing. I use the evaluating strategy more when I am reading for school than when I am reading for pleasure. I use the monitoring strategy every time a read and when I detected a problem in my comprehension I often go back and reread where got confused, using a repairing strategy. I don't predict when I am reading school related text because they are often information based versus having a plot. When I am reading for pleasure I often make predictions but it is more unconscious than conscious; I don't sit down and take the time to think about what might happen in the story. It is more something that happens when I am just happens after I have read a section of the book. I question text more when I am reading for school, but I also think this is a strategy I don't take a lot of time to think about, rather I just think of questions while I am reading. I often use a highlighter to help me remember the important parts of an informational text so that I can go back and remember what was important quickly. If I summarize what has happened when I read for pleasure it is only to explain the book to another, but in this process I leave out important information that would give away the story. I might summarize an informational text for a teacher in class or in written form. Finally, I visualize more when I am reading for pleasure than for school. Unfortunately, this often means I do not like movies that are based on books because they do not look like what I had imagined in my head. When I read for pleasure I usually do not go beyond stage 2 of the reading process unless I am discussing the book with someone else who read it. But when reading for school I go through all 5 stages depending on the class and teacher I have read the text for.
I also thought about my student's comprehension process. My students spend a lot of time reading; with the teacher, in literacy centers, and on their own; but when they do discuss books it is often in an IRE format or recitation instead of a true discussion. Most of the time the teacher asks students content question, but occasionally she will ask open ended questions. Almost all, if not all, of these questions are to help students make text to self connections, such as after reading a book about making a sandwich she asked the students what kinds of things they like to put on their sandwich. While it is important to learn about text to self connections these open ended questions should push students to text to world connections, text to text connections, and more higher order thinking. Even though there are a few open ended questions most discussion after reading is short and only checks whether the students were listening and could answer content questions. Then the rest of literacy time the students spend practicing reading the books. The students are still learning to read and it is important for them to read a lot, but there are many other components of literacy, like the comprehension process, that students should also be working on.
One comprehension strategy that my students often use when reading a book with my mentor teacher is predicting. They start by looking at the front cover and sharing what they think the story might be about from the picture they see. Then my mentor teacher helps the kindergarteners read the title. The students then talk about what else they think might happen in the story after knowing the title. Finally, the teacher often flips through the story, displaying the picture for the students to see. They use this new knowledge to add more details to their prediction of the story's plot. After they have read the story at least once my mentor teacher will often ask them to compare what they predicted would happen in the story with what actually happened in the story. The students' predicting often activates their background knowledge. They frequently reference events that happened in their life to make predictions about what might happen to the characters in the story. Or if something happened to the characters that also happened to them they want to share it with the class.
My students also use the comprehension strategy of summarizing. They read a different big book every week; reading the same book everyday throughout the week with the teacher and on their own. For this reason the teacher will ask one of the students to remind the rest of the class what they read yesterday in the story. Summarizing requires the students to pic out the most important ideas in the story and relate them to make them easier for their peers to remember. Different students get a chance throughout the week to practice summarizing the books and the classes discussion from the previous day. Although my mentor teacher incorporates some of the comprehension strategies in her literacy teaching she could include more to help students move beyond stage 2 of the reading process.
(The comment link would not let me post this response because it said it was too long. For that reason I am posting my response as a separate post instead of as a comment.)
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