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Processing and comprehension strategies for reading
Reading strategies include processing strategies and comprehension strategies. The reading processing strategies are the "in-the-head" ways in which readers make use of the sources of information in the text to decode words. They include attending and searching (looking for particular text features or information), predicting what will be in the text (for example, words, text features, or content), cross-checking to confirm that the reading makes sense and fits, and self-correcting by searching for more information when an error is detected.
The ways in which students learn and apply the processing strategies illustrate the importance of metacognition in literacy learning. For example, readers developing more advanced skills might need to be taught how to search for and identify technical language in a text and encouraged to cross-check its meaning using contextual information. Students whose control of the processing strategies is limited may process text in inappropriate ways, for example, by trying to sound out every single word or by making random guesses rather than using the available sources of information in the text or their own prior knowledge.
Reading comprehension strategies enable readers not only to make sense of a text but also to think about what they are reading and enter into a mental dialogue with the author.
The main comprehension strategies that proficient readers use are:
- making connections between texts and their prior knowledge
- forming and testing hypotheses about texts
- asking questions about texts
- creating mental images or visualising
- inferring meaning from texts
- identifying the writer's purpose and point of view
- identifying the main idea or theme in a text
- summarising the information or events in texts
- analysing and synthesising ideas, information, structures, and features in texts
- evaluating ideas and information.
Effective Literacy Practice in Years 5–8, NZ Ministry of Education, 2006. p.36.
Developing readers' processing strategies
Effective teachers provide instruction that is both strategic and explicit when working with students as they refine and extend these basic but essential strategies. For some learners, especially those who need further support in the basics of reading, the emphasis may be on decoding in order to make meaning (though these students should also be encouraged to think critically about what they are reading and to make connections with other texts). But for most fluent, independent readers, the emphasis will be on exploring meaning at deeper levels and making many kinds of connections and comparisons. Above all, the activities should be motivating and enjoyable for all students. The processing strategies are briefly described below.
Attending and searching
Learners need to attend to details of texts in order to decode, find information, determine meaning, and learn about text forms and features. The learner uses the sources of information to look purposefully for ideas or concepts, facts, vocabulary, patterns of syntax, and information in symbols, illustrations, and diagrams. For fluent and independent readers, this usually involves attending to larger chunks of text. These readers slow down to identify and focus on specific words and features only when they need to do so in order to ascertain, clarify, or extend meaning or thinking. For students who need further support in the basics of reading, attending and searching could involve attending closely to most words and to the illustrations.
Predicting
Predicting is a strategy that readers use to anticipate what will come next. It involves forming an expectation on the basis of information acquired so far and drawing on their prior knowledge and experience of the world and of text content, structure, and language. Predicting, then, is strongly related to meaning and is more than mere speculation. For fluent and independent readers, predicting involves using prior knowledge and information in the text quickly, and sometimes automatically, to decide (at least initially) on the meaning of unknown words, terms, and phrases or difficult passages or to anticipate such things as the next event in a narrative or the next step in a procedural text. For students who need further support in the basics of reading, predicting will also involve drawing on prior knowledge and information from semantic, syntactic, and visual and grapho-phonic sources to predict individual words.
Cross-checking, confirming, and self-correcting
Readers need to cross-check their predictions about vocabulary, content, or meaning as they read to ensure that the predictions make sense and fit with the other information that they have already processed in the text. When readers detect an error or suspect an alternative meaning, they need to know what to do about this. For fluent and independent readers, cross-checking usually involves searching for additional information relating to content, meaning, or vocabulary to confirm their initial understanding of the text. Such readers usually check their predictions swiftly and automatically. For students who are still learning the basics of reading, crosschecking might also involve drawing on their prior knowledge of semantic, syntactic, and visual and grapho-phonic sources of information to confirm their predictions. Self-correcting involves readers cross-checking, correcting, and confirming (and often re-predicting) as they read. The reader may self-correct by turning a partially correct response or idea into a wholly correct one. Students need to know that good readers habitually cross-check, confirm, and self-correct and that they take responsibility for using these strategies.
Effective Literacy Practice in Years 5–8, NZ Ministry of Education, 2006. pp.139–140.
Developing comprehension strategies: An introduction
Comprehension is both a pathway to reading and an end product of reading. Whether we are reading silently, reading aloud, or listening to someone read, we enter into a mental dialogue with the writer and explore their ideas or our own in order to make connections, construct meaning, and generate responses and new ideas. And when we clarify, explore, and extend ideas through discussion with other readers, we develop critical-thinking skills. Students need to develop a repertoire of strategies that they can select from purposefully and independently to build and enhance their understanding of text and to extend their critical awareness. These are reading comprehension strategies, which are closely linked to the strategies used for processing text. Proficient readers select comprehension strategies according to the requirements of the reading task. Before reading, for example, a student's set task may require that they make connections in order to activate their own prior knowledge or think of questions in order to set a purpose for the reading. A reader is likely to draw on a wide range of strategies during their first reading of a text. Some strategies are particularly useful as a way of extending thinking after the reading, when the reader has gained an overview of the text, for example, identifying the main idea, analysing and synthesising, and evaluating. Students will have begun to use reading comprehension strategies when they started learning to read; they refine their use as they develop as proficient readers and apply the strategies to increasingly challenging and complex texts. While it is useful to consider comprehension strategies individually, readers use them in combinations, and these become increasingly complex as readers progress. When identifying the main idea of a text, for example, readers need to question, analyse, infer, and synthesise.
"Comprehension is an active cycle of mental activity... good readers do not sit back and passively wait for meaning to come to them. They talk to themselves about the meaning they are building."
Duffy, G. G. (2003). Explaining Reading: A Resource for Teaching Concepts, Skills, and Strategies. New York: The Guilford Press.
"Comprehension strategies are specific, learned procedures that foster active, competent, self-regulated and intentional reading."
Trabasso, T. and Bouchard, E. (2002). “Teaching Readers How to Comprehend Text Strategically”. In Comprehension Instruction: Research-based Best Practices, ed. C. C. Block and M. Pressley. New York: The Guilford Press.
Making connections, forming and testing hypotheses, asking questions
Helping students to make connections between what they know and what they are reading improves their comprehension. Teachers can model making such connections, and prompt students to make links with their own knowledge and experience, when they are introducing and discussing texts for reading and in writing and oral-language activities. When activating students' prior knowledge for a particular purpose, teachers can help the students to hypothesise, infer, and build their own interpretations as they read.
Readers
- think about what they already know about the content and text form and draw on their own cultural knowledge, their experience of the world, and their knowledge of text forms to make meaning
- focus on an aspect of the text, for example, a structure, word, phrase, event, or idea that they want to know more about and relate this aspect to their prior knowledge
- think about how connecting the aspect of the text to their prior knowledge helps them understand the text better.
Forming and testing hypotheses about texts
Hypotheses are expectations or predictions that the reader forms about the text. They are formed before and during the reading. Proficient readers test and revise their hypotheses as they encounter and act upon new information in the text. Depending on the learning goal, a hypothesis may relate to any aspect of the text, for example, its structure, theme, and characterisation, its possible content, or how it engages the reader. The teacher can usefully model forming a hypothesis when introducing a text. Testing and revising the hypothesis can be modelled later on, during the reading and discussion. This process encourages students to think critically about their own hypotheses, to seek and give feedback about hypotheses, and to revise them in the light of new information. Students often form a hypothesis as a result of asking their own questions about the text.
Readers
- use clues in the text, such as the cover, the blurb, or specific language features, to make links to prior knowledge and form a hypothesis or expectation about the text
- read to check whether the text supports this hypothesis or expectation
- reflect on the hypothesis and revise it if necessary in the light of new information or of the reader's new thoughts about the hypothesis.
Asking questions
Fluent readers spontaneously and continuously pose questions for themselves and attempt to answer these questions (for example, by forming hypotheses) as they interact with the text. They "talk to themselves" about what they are reading, and they do this automatically. They pose questions for themselves about the unfolding content of the text, about the meaning of parts of the text (including particular words and phrases), or about the significance of specific language features. Questioning helps to reinforce the habit of reading for a purpose. The teacher can raise students' awareness of the importance of formulating appropriate questions for themselves by, for example, modelling this strategy during shared reading and asking the students to formulate their own questions that relate to a shared learning goal. Asking questions helps readers to engage with the ideas in the text and with the writer and gives focus to the reading task. After students have read a text, it is useful to help them evaluate the effectiveness of the questions they posed for themselves, to identify the benefits they gained by asking questions as they read, and to give them feedback for further learning.
Readers
- focus on an aspect of the text that interests or confuses them
- formulate a question that relates to the content or to a selected text feature
- record the question, or keep it in mind as they read, so that they can recognise and bring together relevant information as it arises
- reflect, as a result of the questions they set themselves, on what they've found out and on how this has changed their thinking or helped their comprehension
- ask new questions in the light of what they've found out.
Effective Literacy Practice in Years 5–8, NZ Ministry of Education, 2006. pp.141–151.
Creating mental images or visualising, and inferring
When readers visualise, they connect the ideas in the text with their prior knowledge and experience to create images in their minds. This often means thinking about their senses and using their imagination to see, hear, feel, taste, or smell parts of the text in their minds. Creating an image can make a text come alive for the reader. The ability to visualise what is being explained or what is happening draws readers into the text. Studies have indicated that creating an image in the memory helps the reader to retain what is read and use it later on. Readers experiencing difficulties often need help with creating mental images and may not realise how this can help their comprehension. Teachers can support students in visualising by asking questions such as "What image do you see in your head?", by explicitly drawing attention to descriptive language or a sequence of ideas, and by sharing their own images. Visualising can be supported by creating graphic representations or mind maps of a text.
Readers
- identify words that are descriptive or that indicate the content of a text
- make connections with prior knowledge and use their awareness of their five senses to create a mental image
- draw on the mental image and use it to gain a deeper understanding or appreciation of the text.
Inferring
Inferring means using content in a text, together with existing knowledge, to come to a personal conclusion about something that is not stated explicitly in the text. When the writer provides clues but not all the information, we read "between the lines" to form hypotheses, revise these, understand underlying themes, make critical judgments, and draw conclusions. The teacher can help students to make inferences by raising their awareness that reading involves more than just literal meaning and by modelling inferential thinking during shared reading or during discussions in guided reading. Or the teacher may pause, when reading a text with students, to draw out clues from the text and prompt the students to make connections between different parts of the text in order to reach a conclusion that makes sense. It's important to ask students to give evidence from the text that supports their inferences.
Readers
- draw on their awareness that some meanings may not be explicit in the text and question the messages of the text as they read
- keep in mind their "hunches" about deeper meanings and search for clues or evidence in the text as they continue to read
- make links between their developing knowledge of the text and the author's style (drawing on their sense of where the author is taking the text) in relation to these clues
- form hypotheses, based on the links they have made, about implied meanings in the text
- reflect on the validity of their inferences by taking account of new evidence or clues that arise as they continue reading.
Effective Literacy Practice in Years 5–8, NZ Ministry of Education, 2006. pp.141–151.
Identifying the writer's purpose and point of view
It is important for readers to recognise that behind every text is a writer, and that the writer has a purpose or reason for writing and a particular point of view. For example, the purpose of the writer may be to:
- provide or obtain information
- share the excitement of an event
- persuade or influence the reader or provoke debate
- create or enter a personal world
- stimulate the imagination
- convey important cultural stories or myths
- entertain or delight the reader.
By supporting students in identifying and reflecting on an author's purpose and point of view, teachers can help their students to recognise that writers bring their own experiences and insights to their writing. Such activities contribute richly to students' awareness of the functions of texts and of how authors position readers. They also help students to build the habit of responding thoughtfully to what they read. Students then carry their awareness and thoughtfulness into their writing and use it to help them plan and articulate their own purpose and point of view when writing a text.
Readers
- identify themselves with a writer who is writing for a purpose
- think about the intended audience of a text and reflect on how this might affect, for example, how the writer chooses what to include and what to leave out
- search for specific indicators of the writer's personal thinking, such as examples of the writer's choice of content or vocabulary
- reflect on this information as they interpret the text.
Effective Literacy Practice in Years 5–8, NZ Ministry of Education, 2006. pp.141–151.
Identifying the main idea, and summarising
This means determining what is central to a text – what the writer most values or wants to emphasise. In a narrative, this might be the theme or themes, which will probably relate to people and how they live their lives. In a transactional text, it might be the key information or the particular idea about the topic that the writer wants readers to understand. In some transactional text forms, such as reports or letters to the editor, the main idea is often made explicit at the beginning. In fiction, the main idea is more often implied, in a variety of ways, throughout the text. A text may have more than one main idea or theme, but this comprehension strategy involves identifying the idea or ideas that are most important throughout the text, not ideas of lesser importance and not those that feature only in one section of the text.
Identifying the main idea does not mean identifying the topic or content of a text. For example, a story might be about a character breaking his leg, but the main idea (theme) of the text might be about the way the character overcomes adversity or discovers the value of friendship. Often it is relatively easy for a reader to state what a text is about, but it may be more difficult to decide what the main idea is. The reader needs to interpret the writer's thinking by making connections to their prior knowledge, hypothesising, inferring, and synthesising several aspects of the text in order to identify the main idea.
Readers
- identify with the writer as someone who has a main idea to convey (by thinking "Supposing I am the writer of this, what is the main thing that I want the reader to think about?")
- search for evidence that indicates what the writer's main idea may be (including evidence of the writer's purpose)
- consider all the evidence in order to decide or hypothesise about what the writer's main idea is
- check their hypothesis as they read, revising it when appropriate.
Summarising
Summarising helps the reader to see how information or events are related and to understand the content and structure of a text. The reader identifies the important information or events in a text or part of a text and remembers, retells, or records them in a shortened form, which enables the reader to make connections within the text. A summary brings together the essential content of a text succinctly as a clear overview or outline. For example, a written or oral summary may describe the beginning, middle, and end of a narrative or the main facts from an information text or a specific paragraph. In order to summarise a text effectively, the reader needs to have a clear idea of its structure and to be able to differentiate between important points and supporting details. To do this, the reader identifies key words, facts, events, or ideas and notes which parts of the text contain the details that go with each of them. When summarising, the reader puts the important points into their own words, using language as economically as possible and avoiding repetition. A summary may support in-depth work with the text. With certain texts, summarising may not be a useful strategy to support students' understanding. Some poems or sets of instructions, for example, do not include key points with supporting detail.
Readers
- consider the organisation of the text and use it to help them identify the more important points from each section or paragraph
- state each important point succinctly in their own words, sometimes in their head and sometimes by saying it aloud or writing it down
- order and link the important points in a cohesive way that enables them to remember and access the information in order to meet their reading purpose.
Effective Literacy Practice in Years 5–8, NZ Ministry of Education, 2006. pp.141–151.
Analysing and synthesising, and evaluating
When readers take apart a text they have read, examine it from their own viewpoint, and put it back together again, they make it their own. When they compare different texts, drawing out similarities and differences and deciding on the reasons for these, they create a new web of knowledge. As they analyse and synthesise, readers identify ideas, information, or features in a text, reflect on these in relation to their existing knowledge and cultural values (or to ideas from other texts), and form conclusions, interpreting the text's meaning by drawing ideas together. Analysing and synthesising is a creative process that can enable readers to take ownership of the texts they read and the ideas and information in them. Analysing and synthesising is a valuable strategy to use when bringing a more critical perspective to a text, for example, during a second reading or subsequent, closer readings.
Readers
- identify and reflect on the ideas, features, or structures of a text (or texts) and consider how they link to the other ideas, features, or structures and to the reader's prior knowledge and experience
- look for common elements, for example, similarities in the writer's use of imagery within a text or similarities in ideas across several texts, in order to reach a conclusion that relates to their learning goal or reading purpose
- use this conclusion to inform their thinking and generate new ideas to help them meet their learning goal or reading purpose.
Evaluating ideas and information
Thoughtful readers respond to the texts they read in a personal, informed way. They generalise from the ideas and information in a text and make judgments about them in the light of their prior knowledge and experience (including their experiences of other texts), their cultural values, and their purpose for reading. They examine and evaluate the ideas and information in the text and may consequently go on to confirm, extend, or change their personal views. They may disagree with the message of a text or explain why they find an argument unconvincing (for example, if they feel that the writer has used unsound evidence in an attempt to influence or "position" their thinking).
As students develop information literacy, they learn to recognise relevant and valid information, interpret it, and evaluate it in terms of its usefulness and reliability. Thoughtful readers also evaluate the writer's style, including their choice of language and other text features.
Readers
- focus on selected ideas and information in the text and consider these in relation to their own world view and their purpose for reading
- make thoughtful, evidence-based judgments about the selected ideas and information ("What do I think about this? Do I agree, or do I have a different view? What is my view based on?")
- consider how these judgments affect their response to the text and whether they need to seek further information or check how others have responded to the same text.
Effective Literacy Practice in Years 5–8, NZ Ministry of Education, 2006. pp.141–151. Teaching the Strategies
Explicit teaching improves readers' comprehension
Explicit teaching of processing and comprehension strategies involves:
- providing an explicit description of the selected strategy and how it should be used
- modelling the use of the strategy (which includes "thinking aloud" as they model the strategy)
- scaffolding students to enable them to use the strategy with gradually increasing independence
- having students articulate what they are doing as they use the strategy; encouraging students to apply the strategy independently as they read a range of texts and reflect on what they are doing.
Being able to articulate how they are processing and comprehending text enhances students' metacognitive awareness. When readers can identify, articulate, and explain the comprehension strategies they use in particular situations, they will be able to transfer these strategies to other reading contexts. Shared and guided reading sessions often have explicit teaching of reading strategies at their heart. The success of such teaching depends on the teacher using assessment effectively to identify which strategies their students most need to develop and practise. Effective literacy teachers continually gather and analyse data that reveals their students' current ability to make meaning of and think critically about the texts they need to read. Too much emphasis on explicit strategy instruction, however, can have a negative impact on student learning.
Researchers have pointed out that: "... some of the more skillful readers in our classrooms find that strategy instruction, particularly in large doses, interferes with their reading ... A moderate amount of strategy instruction seems to heighten these students' awareness of what they do as they read. However, insistence on prolonged use of imposed strategies and scaffolds seems intrusive and cumbersome ... Explicit and systematic strategy instruction should clarify for students what skillful readers do, but it should not constrain them from doing it."
Villaume and Brabham, 2002, pp. 674–675.
The challenge for teachers is to ensure that their students develop mastery of the processing and comprehension strategies through explicit instruction that does not intrude on the message of the text or limit the reader's enjoyment of reading. This challenge can be met if the strategies are learned in context, for an authentic learning goal. "... when readers are taught to use comprehension strategies, their comprehension, in fact, improves." Pressley, 2002b, page 298. "... thoughtful, active, proficient readers are metacognitive; they think about their own reading during reading." Keene and Zimmerman, 1997, page 22.
Effective Literacy Practice in Years 5–8, NZ Ministry of Education, 2006. p.152.
Helping students to become strategic readers
Research shows that teachers can make a difference by providing focused instruction to meet the needs of all their students. Effective literacy strategies will work for students in different ways and at different levels. The following chart shows some ways that teachers can use strategies to meet the learning needs of their students, including their reading needs.
How students learn
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What teachers do
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imitate
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identify and face challenges and overcome problems
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- set instructional objectives based on students’ identified needs
- plan activities with appropriate kinds and levels of challenge
- provide opportunities for students to solve problems
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understand and help set learning goals for tasks
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- help students to understand the learning goals of tasks
- build shared goals
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make connections
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- show students how to activate their prior knowledge
- help students to see relationships between what they know and what they are learning
- monitor to ensure that students make connections
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practise
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- provide opportunities for practice through text-based activities
- monitor learning and plan next steps
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develop the ability to apply their learning and transfer it to new contexts
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- plan opportunities for students to apply learning
- show students how to use their learning in new contexts
- monitor this transfer
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respond to and seek feedback
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- give timely and appropriate feedback
- provide opportunities for students to act on the feedback
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reflect on and regulate their learning.
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- help students to build metacognitive awareness
- encourage students to evaluate and reflect critically on their learning.
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Effective Literacy Practice in Years 9–13, NZ Ministry of Education, 2004. p.58.
What does it look like?
Example 1
Take students through the stages required to select and use appropriate processing and comprehension strategies with confidence, to help them read texts for practical purposes.
Extract from teaching task: The purposes of the reading and the information sought are all "real world" examples using a wide range of common, familiar texts – these should interest and challenge all students. Display a wide range of texts, including items such as a letterbox, junk mail (including spam email), notices, clothing labels, newspapers, and so on. Tip the bag or box onto a desk for dramatic effect.
Explain that we are constantly bombarded with text and that we need to be able to:
- understand the purpose of each text
- know what each part or section contains
- find the information we want
- understand the language and abbreviations
- make a link between the text and what we already know.
Expand upon each of these points explaining the value of each skill to the student.
Example 2
1,2,3 Strategy
The "1, 2, 3" strategy helps students select and use appropriate processing and comprehension strategies with confidence when encountering a new text for the first time in a close reading activity. The goal is that students learn to operate independently when working with unfamiliar texts in other settings without teacher guidance. Students complete various "readings" of an unfamiliar text. Each reading:
- builds on the previous reading to develop deeper understandings
- often looks for a particular specific pattern within the text.
First or "pre" reading (that is, the steps a student takes before making a complete reading of a text) like:
- considering the title
- skim reading, marking text layout features like sub headings
- giving initial impressions or expectations about the text.
Second reading (that is, a first complete reading of the text) in order to:
- clarify and develop initial impressions (for example, the significance of the title and text layout features).
Third (and further) reading(s) to enable:
- a close reading aiming for a deeper understanding of particular aspects or "patterns" in the text
- students to look for significant patterns in the writer's selection of words or images, for example, a pattern observed could indicate similarities or contrasts
- revisiting and clarifying of earlier impressions.