By Sara Finegan

         I post on a lot of message boards about learning disabilities and autism, and I also get a lot of emails from people who are following my blogs.  One of the most frequent topics is:  how a teacher told a parent that a student “doesn’t have reading comprehension.”

         Naturally, the parents want to know what to do. 

         The problem, of course, is that reading comprehension isn’t something you “HAVE” or “GET”, as in purchasing at a store or obtaining through a tutor.  You can’t put it on and take it off like a sweater, and you can’t keep it in the fridge until you need it.

         Reading comprehension is all about a reader’s relationship to text, and is based almost entirely on his or  her engagement and interaction with the piece being read.  It’s the relationship.  Relationship, relationship, relationship.

         Thinking of it in terms of a relationship leads me to the next step, which is to ask whether, when a friend discusses  a relationship that is flawed or failing, we simply let him or her  say “it’s not good” and leave it at that, or whether we start probing and asking questions to try to piece out what’s going on (or not going on).

         If you’re the kind of person who runs a demanding classroom, that’s exactly what you do.

What is this relationship with text made up of? 

         What behaviors does one see in a good relationship with text?  I’m ready to talk about a few, and will post more at another time.

         We’ll start with fiction and narrative.  (The relationship a reader has with informational, non-fiction text involves some different behaviors, so that will be the topic of another post.)  Research has shown that good readers of fiction do a number of different things when they read: 

• They visualize what they are reading about.  Like a movie in one’s head, a good reader sees what the text is describing.  This helps the reader enter into the world of the story, and leads to all sorts of other behaviors we like to see.
• They make inferences based on what they’re reading.  Good readers know that, in the best stories, the author shows you what’s happening instead of telling you directly, and they are able to infer ideas, feelings, and motives, not to mention facts, from what the author does with words.
• They ask questions as they read.  Lots of questions, knowing that they will find the answers in the story as it moves along.  This is done especially when they are trying to figure out what is going on, but also when they are thinking about things like character motives, and the conflict in the story.
• They use their background knowledge (personal, and from other stories they’ve read, as well as knowledge about the genre) to make predictions.  A good reader is going to know in a fantasy novel that there is going to be a struggle between good and evil, and that magical or fantastical creatures are probably going to play a role in the battle.  A good reader is going to use her personal knowledge of what it’s like to be the youngest in the family to predict how a baby sister may react during a family holiday. 
• They make connections between their own experiences and feelings and those of characters in the book.  They also make connections between world events and issues and people and events in the book.  And they make connections between stories, comparing one character in a book to a character in another book, etc.
• They check for understanding, pausing periodically to make sure they know what’s happening, and going back and re-reading if it’s unclear to them.

         It is our obligation as teachers to investigate, when a child clearly isn’t understanding what she or he is reading, what behaviors the child is engaging in, and what reading behaviors are weak.  It is based on this information that we can devise interventions that work, supports that help the child begin to make meaning from text.

         In a demanding classroom, the staff pays attention to each reader, keeping notes or logs about conferring sessions, guided reading interactions, and other data that will help them determine what skills to teach next. 

          In a demanding classroom, the teacher can, with pretty good specificity, explain to parents and colleagues what particular areas of need the child has with regard to his or her relationship to a book or story. 

          And in a demanding classroom, a report at a parent conference that “Johnny doesn’t understand what he’s reading” is followed immediately by  “and I have observed him and conferred with him, and I think here’s what’s going on and what our next steps should be.” 

For more of my posts on reading comprehension teaching strategies, see our other blog, Readers With Autism: http://readerswithautism.com .

autism · background knowledge · connections · demanding classroom · fiction · high expectations · inferences · inferencing · learning disabilities · learning disabled · narrative · predictions · questioning · questions · Reading · reading behaviors · reading comprehension · relationship · relationship with text · rigor · Sara Finegan · special education · standards · teaching strategies · understanding · visualization · visualize

By Sara Finegan 

         The other day I was reminded anew of the most powerful inspiration and teaching tool in the classroom:  peer sharing.

         We’re still at the early stage of learning how to write a paragraph describing a character that is the second part of our standard Response to Literature.  We’d done a lesson on the “how-to” where I modeled and charted the steps.

          We’d done a guided lesson  on the first several steps:   collecting facts about the character from our reading; organizing them by numbering them in the order we would write them.  For the purpose of this activity, we were all writing about the same character.

         Once kids had organized their data, I sent them off to try their hand at writing the paragraph.  They were thrilled when they realized that the writing part was soooo much easier if you had prepared the list and put numbers next to it – all they had to do was turn the jotted notes into actual sentences.  As their writing continued, they felt better and better.

They found two partners to share out with

         Since we had time left over before the bell rang, I asked them to find two partners and share out their work.   I didn’t think this was going to be particularly powerful, since everyone was using essentially the same facts about the same character.  But even in a demanding classroom there are those dead moments when things have gone faster than you’d anticipated, and there’s still instructional time left. 

         Boy, was I wrong

         Within about 7 minutes, every single one of my students was back at his or her desk, writing furiously.    As I passed by him, Robert raised his head and asked “Is it ok if I write more?  I read what Drew wrote and I realized I had more to say.”

         Was it okay if he wrote more?  I gave him the “DUH” look and a thumbs up.

         At the other end of the room, Antonio was reading his own piece, pausing to think, and then drawing arrows down to free lines on the page and adding more sentences.  “I forgot that I could write about an inference I have about the character,” he said.  “That’s what James did.” 

         Now, we all know of groups of kids with limited independent thinking skills whose interaction with the work of their peers pretty much involves copying each other, or copying off each other.   In that stage of the learning process, peer sharing is still valuable, but perhaps in a different format.  (For example, showing the whole class one student’s work at a time on the document camera and having discussions as a group about the writing often works to show kids that many styles of writing are good writing, or how one of the students handled a particularly difficult writing task.)

My guidance wasn’t needed! 

         In this case, it was perfectly fine to allow the kids unstructured time to gather in small groups and share out without my participation or direction.

         This worked because the kids are confident in their ability to learn and to improve, and their understanding that opportunities to enhance their skills exist all over the place.  They trust one another and allow themselves to be inspired by each other in ways that teachers cannot emulate. 

         In a demanding classroom, the kids sometimes demand more intellectual work of one another than the teacher!

demanding classroom · high expectations · learning disabled · peer inspiration · peer sharing · Reading · response · rigor · rigorous instruction · Sara Finegan · special education · standards · Writing