Defining Comprehension

Strategies and

Instructional Strategies

Jocelyn Caswell

Walden University

September 17, 2015

Defining Metacognition: Thinking about Thinking

  Dr. Lisa Bald (2014i) describes metacognition as a process that includes regulating, checking and repairing.

  Metacognition includes an awareness of one’s thinking, a knowledge of learning needs and regulation of cognitive strategies (Afflerbach, Cho, Kim, Crassas & Doyle, 2013).

  Pro’s of metacognition include increased reading comprehension, promotion of academic learning and control of reading (Afflerbach, Cho, Kim, Crassas& Doyle,2013).

Defining Comprehension

  When one understands what is read, they are comprehending text.

Hollenback and Saternus (2013) describe this as meaning the reader constructs after interaction with a text.

Comprehension Strategies and Instructional Strategies

  Comprehension strategies are for students. These are used to help students monitor their comprehension as they move through a text.

  Instructional strategies are conditions created by a teacher to facilitate learning (Laureate Education, Inc., 2014g). This instruction teaches students about comprehensions strategies and how to employ in reading.

Comprehension Strategies

 Comprehension Monitoring

 Questioning

“Expert readers use a variety of comprehension strategies to construct meaning while

reading” (Hollenback and Saternus, 2013).

Comprehension Monitoring   Using this strategy, students differentiate between what is understood

and what is confusing.

  Students must know how to regulate, check for understanding and repair confusion.

  Essential to provide students with steps until this strategy is used with automaticity.

Example: Read, stop, restate what is happening, find difficulty, repair.

*The National Reading Panel (2000) explains how comprehension monitoring helps students become aware of comprehension struggles, thus improving comprehension.

Questioning   Students mentally ask and answer questions about a text before, during and after reading.

  Students must be taught how to formulate questions and types of questions that can stem from text.

Example: Teacher modeling and Think-Alouds.

Students can work in collaborative groups to practice building textual questions.

  Graphic organizers can be used for students to ask and answer questions about text.

Instructional Strategies

  Modeling, Scaffolding, Guided Practice

Example: I do, we do, you do.

  Collaborative Learning

Modeling, Scaffolding, Guided Practice   Modeling provides students with an exemplar model

of the specific task.

Example: Think-Alouds to model regulation of text.

  Guided practice and scaffolding give students support in the new task using a gradual release of responsibility. Using these two practices, the teacher guides the student in the practice with varying support.

Collaborative Learning   A learning condition in which students work together in building comprehension strategies.

Example: Students work in a collaborative group to practice forming questions about a text.

Cognitive Aspects of Comprehension

  Includes awareness of text and ability to make meaning.

  Students are expected to use such skills and strategies with increasing rigor (Afflerbach, Cho, Kim, Crassas & Doyle, 2013).

  Examples of cognitive skills include phonics and comprehension.

  Common Core supports cognitive strategies.

Affective Aspects of Comprehension

Moods, feelings and attitudes—Epistemic beliefs, self-efficacy, motivation and engagement.

  Emotional aspects of learning such as beliefs about knowledge, or epistemic beliefs.

Afflerbach, Cho, Kim, Crassas & Doyle describe self-efficacy as a student’s thoughts about performance abilities.

  Motivation and engagement includes a student’s effort and quality of participation within the learning environment (Afflerbach, Cho, Kim, Crassas & Doyle, 2013).

A Daily DEAR Program: Drop Everything, and Read!

  Independent, choice reading time that occurs in a classroom daily. Teachers use this time to work with students one on one, addressing deficient skills.

  Teachers and students work together to create realistic goals for student reading development and reflect on past learning/growth.

  Teachers model strategies and skills for students during the mini-lesson.

Author Study: Improving Reading Comprehension

Using Inference and Comparison

  Students need to be aware of their own thinking in order to build an inference.

  Students use metacognition to regulate building background knowledge, finding textual evidence and making educated assumptions about an author.  

  This is a higher order comprehension skill as multiple processes/strategies are used to develop inferences.

References Afflerbach, P., Cho, B.-Y., Kim, J.-Y., Crassas, M. E., & Doyle, B. (2013).

Reading: What else matters besides strategies and skills? The Reading Teacher, 66(6), 440–448.

Hollenbeck, A. F., & Saternus, K. (2013). Mind the comprehension iceberg: Avoiding titanic mistakes with the CCSS. The Reading Teacher, 66(7), 558–568.

Laureate Education (Producer). (2014g). Conversations with Ray Reutzel: Supporting comprehension [Audio file]. Baltimore, MD: Author.

Laureate Education (Producer). (2014j). Metacognition: Thinking about thinking [Multimedia file]. Baltimore, MD: Author.

National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. (2000). Report of the National Reading Panel. Teaching children to read: an evidence- based assessment of the scientific research literature on reading and its implications for reading instruction. Retrieved September, 17, 2015, from http://www.nichd.nih.gov/publications/nrp/smallbook.htm.