Comprehension Strategies

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Strategies versus Skills

  1. Comprehension strategies are procedures that students learn to support independent critical reading of text.
  2. Skills are underlying processes that often support the strategies.
  3. Strategies That Work Posters.pdf
  4. Teacher's Guide.pdf


Resources for teaching Schema (Making Connections)
I use what I know to help me understand the text. (t/s, t/t, t/w)

Resources for teaching Visualizing
I paint a picture or make a movie in my mind using all my senses.

Resources for teaching Making Inferences
I predict and question to draw conclusions and reflect thinking.
  • Reading with Meaning by Debbie Miller, Chapter 8: "Inferring"
  • Mosaic of Thought, Second Edition by Ellin Keene and Susan Zimmermann, Chapter 6: "Creating Meaning: Inference"
  • 7 Keys to Comprehension by Susan Zimmermann, Chapter 5: "Weaving Sense into Words"
  • An overview of teaching inferring, blog post.
  • A blog that describes the 4-part mini-lesson used in a live video conference about inferring what words mean when they are unknown, "Live Video Conference."
  • A blog about an inferring lesson of putting a word on the back of the student and having the students infer the meaning.
  • A blog that describes a mini-lesson using No, David to infer character traits.
  • Saw a lesson delivered by Reading Recovery-trained Alice Smith of Kite Elementary. She used a purse filled with items to teach the skill of inference. As she took one thing out of the purse at a time, the students inferred what the item said about the person who owned the purse. She charted the student's reponses in two columns: Inference/ Evidence. For instance: I infer that the person likes to go to the beach and that she needs sun block to prevent her skin from burning. My evidence is that she had sunscreen in her purse. Great lesson!
  • Inference = Clue + You is one way to teach inferring which means that you take the "clue" or the informaion from the text and you add the "you" which is what you know about the content and you add them together to come up with new meaning which is the inference.
  • Inferring nonfiction. five finger strategy.
  • Inference Task Cards that can be used for mini-lessons or small group active involvement.

Resources for teaching Asking Questions
I ask questions and look for answers--before I read, as I read, after I read.

Resources for teaching Finding Out Important Ideas
I find the main idea, author's purpose, details, topic, etc. as I read.




Resources for teaching Retelling/Summarizing

I can restate the meaning of the text in my own words.





Resources for teaching Text Structures in Nonfiction:
I use this strategy with non-fiction texts; problem/solution, cause/effect, descriptive, compare/contrast, sequence
  • Reading With Meaning by Debbie Miller, Chapter 10, "Determining Importance in Nonfiction"
  • Mosaic of Thought, Second Edition by Ellin Keene and Susan Zimmermann, Chapter 8: "The Heart of the Matter: Determining Importance"
  • 7 Keys to Comprehension by Susan Zimmermann, Chapter 6: "What's Important and Why"
  • An overview of Determining Importance, blog post.
  • This is a first grade unit on Determining Importance.
  • One of the ways that we teach first graders about reading non-fiction and how it is different from fiction is to teach them to recognize non-fiction conventions such as index, glossary, page of contents, photographs, captions, cut-aways... this resource gives an example of a template for a conventions booklet.
  • A blog entry that actually describes a standard-based bulletin board that demonstrates student examples of non-fiction booklets/ notebooks.
  • Nonfiction Author Studies in the Elementary Classroom suggests Gail Gibbons as a first grade nonfiction author to study, Chapter 2: "Growing with Gail Gibbons-Grade 1". Great examples of non-fiction conventions can be found in Gail Gibbons' books.
  • Non fiction booksThis website includes non fiction books that can be read aloud to your students. These books also have great examples of nonfiction conventions.
  • One of the artifacts that we make as we investigate each of the nonfiction conventions is a Nonfiction Conventions Chart. We usually laminate this chart and keep it up all year for the students to use as a reference, This is one examples of a Nonfiction_Conventions_Chart.JPG. Another example is included in this Macarado blog.
  • external image msword.png Nonfiction conventions.doc is a chart that lists nonfiction conventions and gives a definition.
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    external image msword.png
    Nonfiction conventions.doc Using the Nonfiction Conventions Chart above, this is a worksheet that you can give to individual students or partners to use during the work session of the Readers' Workshop. They use the worksheet by writing the title of a book and the page that shows each of the nonfiction conventions listed. This is a worksheet that can be used after all of the nonfiction conventions have been introduced. This could also be used as an assessment.
  • external image msword.png
    external image msword.png
    nonfiction book tags.doc These are examples of basket labels for nonfiction books in a classroom library.
  • Main Idea Task cards that can be used for group discussion of determining the main idea.

Resources for teaching Synthesizing
What I know + What I read = understanding or new idea.
  • Reading With Meaning by Debbie Miller, Chapter 11, "Synthesizing Information"
  • Mosaic of Thought, Second Edition by Ellin Keene and Susan Zimmermann, Chapter 9: "Synthesis"
  • 7 Keys to Comprehension by Susan Zimmermann, Chapter 6: What's Important and Why"
  • In first grade synthesis includes retelling and then summary before synthesizing, getting the gist of a story.
  • This blog does a nice job of describing how to use the beginning/ middle/ end and story elements to tell a 6-8 sentence summary.
  • This blog post explains synthesis with a packet of seeds with the "synthesis - aha moment" coming as the plant blooms.