8 comprehension strategies

I found this weeks reading about the 8 comprehension strategies to be very beneficial. I never thought that there would be so much that went into understanding a text but after reading about the different components I feel like they are all very important.

Predicting: Predicting is something that I see a lot in the classroom. My CT frequently asks the students what they think a story is going to be about or what a character is going to do next. The kindergarten class always has a variety of ideas and thoughts. I think predicting is important when helping to understand a text in that it seems to get the students much more interested and engaged.
Connecting: Connecting is another strategy that is very important and one that I see often. I have learned that 5 and 6 year olds love to talk about themselves and their families so when a story is read and they can connect it to their own lives, they become very excited to share. There is of course the occasional story that has nothing to do with what was just read but nonetheless, I feel like the student is still engaged in the story. Tompkins also discusses the 3 types of connections: text-to-self, text-to-world, and text-to-text. According to Tompkins, "in text-to-self connections, students link the ideas they are reading about to events in their own lives" (p. 228). These are the personal connections that I mostly see in the classroom. In text-to-world connections, students relate what they are reading to the outside world. In text-to-text connections the reader connects the text to a different text.
Visualizing: Visualizing is something that doesn't seem to be discussed much in my classroom. However, I think it's really important for all readers to imagine or picture what they are reading. It definitely helps to connect to the text in a positive way.
Questioning: Questioning is something that is done "out of curiosity" (p. 230). Students may ask questions to "clarify misunderstandings" as well as "reflect on the text" (p. 230). Questioning is also important for engaging and comprehension. Students in my classroom often ask questions about why a character did something or what might happen next. This also plays a part in the prediction aspect of comprehension.
Identifying the Big Ideas: While reading a text students need to know how to separate big ideas from minor details. Tompkins mentions graphic organizers and diagrams which I believe are extremely helpful when comprehending a text. My CT does this quite often and is also used as a prediction strategy.
Summarizing: According to Tompkins, students take the big ideas and focus on those aspects in order to make a "summary statement" (p. 231). Although the students in my class don't necessarily make summary statements, my CT makes sure they know what has happened in the text and what the main components of the story are.
Monitoring: I found the monitoring portion of this chapter really fascinating because while I have found that my students use these strategies; as readers, we never stop using them. How many times have we all read for a class and had to ask ourselves if we understand what the text was about or if we really needed to read the text in its entirety? When I think about it, monitoring is one of the most important aspects of comprehending a text.
Evaluating: Lastly, evaluating is an important strategy that I have seen in different ways in the classroom. Tompkins discusses reflecting in log entries and conferences. I feel like my CT uses group recitations for evaluations as well as things such as worksheets that have a connection to the text. Evaluating is another aspect that we all use in our reading strategies. This blog is a perfect example of evaluating the different chapters and articles we read to make sure we comprehend the texts.

Overall, I feel like these comprehension strategies are all helpful and beneficial no matter what the age. I have seen many of these strategies in the classroom as well as in my own personal reading expereinces.