Comprehension

I really enjoyed reading Gill's article regarding comprehension and the the different strategies that we as teachers can use to enhance student understanding of what we read. I find this particularly interesting in light of my own reading habits and the necessary process of reading efficiently and for understanding. As is true for all content areas that are covered in school, pre-reading activities in which students are able to activate prior knowledge and connect the upcoming read with what they already know, the likelihood of comprehension is much more greater.

I struggle at times with my mind drifting to and fro the reading material and other thoughts. I think the primary reason for this is that I like purpose in why I am reading. As teacher it is our job to make sure that our students understand the purpose behind us assigning reading. We do not want to simply create busy work for the sake of work; we want each reading to have sound reasoning and will help the student get to the goal--which is comprehension.

When I think back to my days as a student in middle and high school, I remember having to answer repetitious questions that were simply content related questions. I got to the point where I would simply look at the post questions first and then just search the text for the answer to that particular question. One of my favorite suggestions from this ready was for the post reading activities. It suggested that activities for post reading should be aimed at enhancing student deeper understanding of text through reflection.

Lastly, I think as teachers we have to get back to the point where reading can be fun. Where students can find a book series or topic that they are interested in and what to pursue. I have done this in my life and I am now an avid reader when I have the opportunity.

This is a photo that I took at one of schools I worked in Uganda and a question that we should be constantly asking ourselves as teachers:

Creating The Fluent Reader

As I was reading this evening regarding reading fluency among students today; my mind kept racing back to this past summer when I was teaching English and Reading in a primary school in Central Uganda. The students are, in general, far behind in the language comprehension and word knowledge because of not only the educational situation, but also because the environment that they have grown up in are not enriching and most of their parents do not speak English. One of my primary methods of helping students first learn to speak and read English was to model and make sure that I was using the correct annunciation. It was amazing the changes and progress that could be seen after only a few months of work.

On the other hand, it was also important that the teachers knew the proper and correct form of words and knew how to read. I really enjoyed getting to sit down and talk through content and instructional strategies and really get a glimpse into what they were thinking about the best way to teach the students to read. Of course, when you are trying to teach 90 students ages 11 to 17 how to read you are going to have a whole new set of issues. The most important part to remember both from my experiences and the reading was to make sure that I am modeling well and being a positive influence.

Diction

Enhancing a student's vocabulary is one of the most important aspects of teaching a learner to read and to comprehend text. It is especially important if the learner comes from a background that was not nourishing and enriching. The article in which that the author talked about the 'ten important words' was very interesting to me and certainly practical for the classroom that I have been working in. During my lesson last week we were reading a story out of the literature book and I would stop after each paragraph and talk about some of the tougher vocabulary and the key words that they book identified.

I think that the strategy described in the book could certainly be effective, however I wonder how that would work with the time constraints that we have. I can definitely see that working in more of a one on one context or a smaller classroom. I think the teacher could certainly tie this strategy into a 'Word of the day' type activity and be more time effective. Nevertheless, I think it is essential as teachers that we explain our diction and the tough words that are being used in all subject areas and create an enriching classroom environment.