Addressing Comprehension in the Classroom

Although we spend a lot of time teaching students to decode in reading, decoding is only a part of becoming a reader. Words are written to represent an idea. The whole point of reading is to understand those ideas and communicate our understanding about them to others. 

So... How can we facilitate that process for our students?

1. Students need to understand a text in their own head before they can communicate their ideas about it to others.

2. Deconstruct responses and generate "look fors" for level 1, 2, 3 and 4.

A of co constructed of responses categorized by level 

3. Once students understand what a level 1, 2, 3, 4 look like develop con constructed feedback on how to bump up the response. 

A co constructed table of "Look fors" and feed back based on strengths and next steps

4. Develop success criteria and the justification for why each component is necessary.

Co-Constructed Success Criteria

5. Then it comes down to practice, practice and more practice using formative feedback.

An independent response from a student after being guided through the above process.

Stay tuned for some strategies that we use to help students monitor their comprehension as they are reading a text.