As a parent, you’ve probably heard about the shift from “learning to read” to “reading to learn” that kids are expected to make around 4th grade. To make this leap into a lifetime of academic and personal discovery, teachers know that kids need strong reading comprehension. But, they’re split on the best ways to develop it.

In an article outlining the latest efforts at boosting kids’ comprehension skills, The Hechinger Report describes mixed approaches–and mixed results. Historically, comprehension instruction in classrooms has involved concrete exercises, such as asking readers to ‘find the main idea.’ But, what if a student can identify the main idea, yet still doesn’t 'get it’?

A newer educational trend tries to alleviate this problem by teaching kids relevant background knowledge and vocabulary before they attempt to read a new book or text. First the class learns about spiders, or county fairs, and then they read Charlotte’s Web. Researchers at the Knowledge Matters Campaign go so far as to call background knowledge “the quarterback of literacy” and "an unsung hero.”

Others, like Kausalai Wijekumar, Professor of Education at Texas A&M University, urge caution when using this tactic. She acknowledges that “people with good background knowledge seem to be able to read faster and understand quicker,” but argues that the majority of a child’s ELA instructional time should not be spent learning material from other subjects.

At some point, you’ve got to be able to read and analyze the text itself, if you want to learn anything new. If you’ve only ever practiced learning about hurricanes from the teacher first, then reading a hurricane book, how can you hope to research hurricanes independently?

Wijekumar herself adopts a systematic, step-by-step approach, asking targeted questions that lead students to better comprehension. If a reader can’t grasp the overall meaning, questions like “Is there a problem?” “What caused it?” and “Is there a solution?” gently guide them in the right direction. This sounds promising, until you realize that she now administers her questioning technique using a self-paced computer program with a negligible positive impact on test scores.

The truth is that “reading to learn” isn’t solely about the act of processing and memorizing cold, hard facts. There is an undeniable human element when it comes to establishing genuine comprehension. As we say on our blog, “Comprehension isn’t only about understanding the meaning of words and sentences. It’s about how your child actively engages with the story.”

Kids are less likely to remember what they just read if they aren’t personally interested or invested in it. This is true of reading for any subject. In today’s issue, we explore how teachers and parents can promote stronger comprehension by helping students at each age get fully immersed in text through active discussions and personal reflection.

In today’s issue:

• Training your young child’s growing brain

• Asking big questions yields big results

• Intertwining reading skills, strategy, and meaning

Train Your Child’s Brain

Even before children can read on their own, they can start building the foundation for strong comprehension. It just takes some parent support to form the right neural pathways!

From repeated readings with mom or dad, looking at the pictures together, and fun conversations, very young kids begin to identify characters, describe what they do, and remember parts of the story. Establishing these thought pattens will be crucial for your child’s understanding of more complex books and texts as they grow up.

Scholastic has some great ideas for how to coach your child through the next picture book you read together, start to finish. For example, looking at the book’s cover and making guesses about what will happen primes your child’s attention. Even after the book is over, asking how the story could have ended differently forces kids to remember what actually happened as they use their creativity to imagine other possibilities.

“What Would You Do?”

In the late 1970s, educational researcher Delores Durkin published a famous study showing teachers only spent 1% of their instructional time developing students’ reading comprehension. Things have gotten a bit better since then according to recent research by Phil Capin. Capin found that teachers now spend 23% of their time on comprehension instruction. But late elementary reading test scores are still stagnant or falling. Why?

According to Capin, much of the time supposedly spent on comprehension isn’t devoted to analyzing text structures, or having extended discussions about meaning–both proven methods for enriching students’ understanding and enjoyment of what they read–but rather on “low-level” questions designed to test factual recall.

Think, “Which city did the main character visit?” rather than a question designed to spark kids’ excitement, curiosity, or personal involvement in the book, such as “What would you have done when you reached the city?” Students will understand and remember more content they read if educators can get them excited with vibrant class discussions that bring everything together.

Science (of Reading) Class

The Science of Reading doesn’t begin and end with phonics, high-school English teacher, Auddie Mastroleo, points out in her piece for Edutopia. Mastroleo argues that it is critically important for teachers to know the full body of science behind how teenagers’ brains process text. This will enable them to help middle and high schoolers achieve the ultimate goal: “comprehension–the ability to read deeply and joyfully and understand what you read.”

Referring to a concept known as “Scarborough’s Reading Rope,” Mastroleo designs activities for her own classes that weave together a number of ‘strands’ into comprehensive comprehension instruction. Her approach doesn’t stop with background knowledge, vocabulary, and basic understanding of text structures, but intertwines them with higher-level verbal reasoning discussion and debate. “I like a classroom buzzing with student talk,” she says. This how students go beyond surface-level comprehension and develop their critical thinking skills.

Is Your Child Already “Reading to Learn”?

Discover Stage 4 of Reading Development, “Reading for Learning and Absorption,” over in our free Raising Skilled Readers parent community! Is your child at this stage yet, still working on it, or already moving on to the final stages of his or her reading journey? Find out now.