Comprehension and the Teacher's Job...and What Proficient Readers DO

Comprehension IS thought.

How does one teach thought?  Everyone can think, so why try to teach how to think? This seems redundant.  In truth, children develop at different rates based on many internal and external influences.  I truly believe that all children want to be successful at school.  Some children need reminders that they all ready have what it takes to be successful.  They need encouragement to see all they possess.  If a child fails to understand a text they are reading, it is the teachers job to help identify first, students who are 'lost' and secondly, how to help lost students reconnect.  When a student doesn't understand something we are really meaning they do not comprehend.  A lack of comprehension may make a student feel inferior, not as smart as their peers, and not very good at school.  If a student has been unsuccessful in understanding things, they may shut down and not participate in the class discussions. Mostly this is seen when children are learning how to read, especially with struggling readers.

A teacher's job is to help identify students who are lost, those who don't quite understand.  It is also a teacher's job to make sure that each of their students develops a reading process system.  A reading process system is simply a set of strategies to become the best reader and the best at comprehending that one can be.  Proficient readers naturally develop these skills.  Struggling or beginning readers need help developing their skills in order to be successful.  These skills are questioning, visualization, inferring, predicting and summarizing.

As they read, proficient or capable readers will ask questions of the text.  They will make mental pictures (visualization) of what is happening.  They infer meaning based on their own background knowledge (schema).  They critique the text by making predictions of what will happen next.  In the end, they can summarize orally, then eventually on paper, what the main points of a particular reading.  Becoming a proficient reader does not mean a student needs to be able to name each strategy they are using.  A proficient reader just knows they can do, and does different things to help themselves understand.

In the classroom, a teacher models how something is done, does shared demonstrations, a guided practice and leads her students to independence.  When a teacher models a strategy she will actually do it AND think out loud.  This shows her students how it helps her to think as she is reading.  Shared demonstrations are initiated by the teacher.  She may say, "Let's read this together, and share what it makes us think about." In other words, she does the thinking with the students.  During guided practice, the students are allowed to practice the strategies on their own while the teacher takes mental or physical notes.  She can still guide the students if they need assistance.  Independence happens when the students initiate the strategies on their own.  The teacher is in the background just waiting and watching her students.  The action she may take at this stage will be encouragement.  She will  reinforce what was done correctly, and or effortlessly by pointing out the students strengths.  Students are also encouraged to talk about how different strategies help them to understand what it is they are reading.

The goal of our schools is not really to teach students how to parrot back answers they think teachers are wanting to hear.  Fact recalling is boring.  Instead, the goal of our schools needs to be to teach our students how to have original thoughts about what they read.  Original thinkers make better problem solvers.  Teachers grow smarter students when they help them make meaning of all they encounter at school.  Smarter students grow up to be smarter citizens.

~ltk