Reflecting on Chapter 2: What We Know About Comprehension (pp. 19-35)

[Kristin Fontichiaro]

Add your thoughts here ... or, if you prefer, start a new discussion topic!

[Elfin]

After though of Chapter 2:
The Comprehension Continuum chart is really very useful and I would like to share with teachers. It reminded me, a former English teacher, what I did inappropriately - created lots of reading log for students to complete as the book reports. I do feel that these book reports are not good tools to striving for higher-level of thinking. The use of teaching language in triggering students' thinking and extanding their curiosity is very important. If not, we are telling them 'off' thinking instead of inspiring them to engage to learn. It is a lesson I am eager to learn - ask questions which foster deeper thinking.

I have an wonder on strategy instruction on reading. I wonder if subjects teachers think this strategy should be taught by language teachers but language teachers may deem the strategy as natural acquisition, no need to teach in explicit way?

[Kristin Fontichiaro]

This issue of explicit vs. "natural" acquisition comes up in lots of Stephanie Harvey's work. I think that many practicing teachers were "natural" readers, but many of our students come from diverse backgrounds and households where, sadly, reading is not part of their natural world. If we don't give strategies for how to interact, our students potentially cannot engage with text. And then they will use the strategy they DO know and close the book.

[Susan E]

I thought Chapter 2 was a helpful review of the current thinking about reading instruction. My district is fully implementing Lucy Calkins' readers' and writers' workshop models (with much hemming and hawing from the middle school teachers who are used to their whole-class novels).

I think one of the most useful ideas for me in my instruction is Stephanie Harvey's continual prodding of teachers to MODEL OUR THINKING OUT LOUD. I've always been a good reader. Can't remember when I wasn't! I'm sure that's the case for many of you. Harvey reminded us what it is like to be a struggling reader with that RNA passage, and it reminded me to think of how my students feel when faced with a difficult reading situation. By practicing "thinking out loud," we can show our students what reading is like in the "real world," when they become adults. I think somewhere in this book (or another one I read recently) the authors encourage teachers to keep a little basket of their current reading...newspapers, magazines, books, etc., and to periodically model what's going on in our head. I love that idea.

[Annie Davis]

I love that idea, too! The entire idea of modeling our thinking out loud is really important, and one that I've found to be very successful. I love this idea and try to use it whenever given the opportunity. Especially at the elementary level, modeling anything, really, is so important, and something that is not done enough (at least in my experience).

[Sharon Hermann]

As we "talk" about this chapter, my comprehension of it has improved, that's for sure. But can I move from understanding to knowledge and then on to active use of knowledge? I hope so. My original background was in a field other than teaching, so I imagine that my comprehension is a bit different since I don't have as much "prior knowledge". But I did come away with some ideas and thoughts that were new to me.

For one thing, the focus on the language of teacher questions and its relationship to comprehension is very interesting to me. I see that our questions play an important role in bringing learners along the comprehension continuum. I guess the reverse might also be true . . . could literal questions and simple retelling obscure larger meaning and keep students preoccupied so that they don't "merge their thinking" with the text?

What about the content of the curriculum? Is all that we teach applicable to the students' daily lives - now or in the future? I think this is actually a harder question that it seems. To stay connected, the content has to change, because the students' lives are changing so quickly. I guess that is why we can enhance comprehension by working harder to find (and adjust as needed) the right "hook" -- the perspective from which to present the content that makes clear its connections to the daily life of the learner and thereby enhances the likelihood of comprehension.

Content information is changing so quickly -- I'd really like to see more emphasis placed on the connections between the process of thinking and its application to student's daily lives. Take the example of Jessica on page 28. She is self-directed. She is monitoring her understanding, she knows when she doesn't understand and she know how to clarify her understanding through the use of additional questions. These are skills or dispositions that will be applicable to her life now and in the future, probably more than a good bit of the content that she will be exposed to during her long student career.

Also, sometimes I wonder if students generally see school as learning for life or as learning to pass a test? As teachers, are we sometimes consciously or unconsciously encouraging the latter viewpoint? And does this attitude, in and of itself, serve to weaken the connections of the knowledge to our students' daily lives and thereby negatively impact active use of the knowledge?