How to keep engaged with your reading to

improve comprehension:

Making connections helps

readers!

Remember the following techniques to make connections: • Relate to characters.

• Visualize.

• Avoid boredom...if you start to get bored, take a short break.

• Pay attention, take your reading seriously.

• Listen to others’ ideas about the reading.

• Read actively and read with intention.

• Ask questions.

• Use an Annotation Method, mark your text, or utilize Double-Entry Diaries.

Text-to-Reader Connections:

How to relate to your reading Text to self: Connections between the text

and the reader’s experiences and memories. The more experiences and memories a reader has about a topic, the easier the material is to read.

Text to world: Connections the reader makes between the text and what he knows about the world (facts and information).

Text to text: Connections the reader makes between two or more types of texts. The reader may make connections relative to plot, content, structure, or style.

Voices: What you “hear” when

you are reading Reciting Voice - The voice a reader hears when he is only

reciting the words and not drawing meaning from the text.

Conversation Voice - The voice that has a conversation with the text. It represents the reader’s thinking as he/she talks back to the text in an interactive way. It can take two forms:

Interacting Voice - This voice encourages the reader to infer, make connections, ask questions, and synthesize information.

Distracting Voice - This voice pulls the reader away from the text.

Your goal to make the most effective use of your reading is to strive for the Interacting Conversation Voice!

Questioning/I Wonder…

Questions can be more powerful than answers. Good readers ask questions throughout the reading process: before, during, and after reading. Readers who ask questions when they read assume responsibility for their learning and improve their comprehension in four ways:

By interacting with text.

By motivating themselves to read.

By clarifying information in the text.

By inferring beyond the literal meaning.

An Annotation Method

Use one of the annotation methods to clear

up confusion and make connections while

reading:

• Sticky Notes

Place sticky notes next to passages that

cause confusion so that you can return to

them.

• Highlighters

Use highlighters to mark places you

understand (pink) and places that are

confusing (yellow).

Good Highlighting:

This represents an example of a good highlighting technique. Focusing on key ideas and terminology.

Bad Highlighting:

Just because you are highlighting the

text doesn’t mean you are doing it

effectively. Do not highlight everything.

Marking Text Marking text helps readers pay attention and

remember what they read. Try this marking

method as a way to increase reading

comprehension:

• Assign codes to the types of thinking in which

you engage. As you read, mark these codes next

to the passages in the text that trigger these kinds

of thinking and explain the connection.

o C = connection reader makes to own life and

text

o ? = questions reader has about text

o I = inference or conclusion reader draws

from text

Double-entry Diaries (DED) DEDs are similar to taking notes.

But are a good Comprehension Technique. Try some of the

following DED strategies:

• Divide page in half with questions and main ideas on the

left and specific information on the right.

• Divide page in half with direct quote from text and page

number on the left and thinking options on the right (reader’s

reactions). A sample of this type of DED is on the next slide.

• Divide page in half with facts or details on the left and

author’s message on the right.

• Divide page in half with confusing part in text on the left

and reader’s attempt to get unstuck on the right.

• Divide page in half with new/confusing vocabulary on the

left and reader’s knowledge on the right.

Here is a sample DED:

Sources:

“Academic Support Guides: Reading Comprehension.” Cuesta College. http://academic.cuesta.edu/acasupp/as/300INDEX.HTM

Krieg, Elaine G. Strategies for College Readers. New York: Longman, 2008. Print.

“Study Skills Activities: Reading as a Study Skill.” Montana State Literacy Resources: A Service of the National Institute of Literacy. http://www.nwlincs.org/mtlincs/pilotproject/studyskills/studyskillsindex.htm