reading strategies and strategic instruction

Last Fall I took a Reading Process course that looked deeply into the miscues that students made while reading. By studying the miscues students made, I was able to truly understand what my students were doing well, what they needed to work on while reading and taught them to see reading as meaning making.  Shortly after beginning that course, I asked my students what it meant to be a good reader.  Most of them replied with knowing your words, reading fast, knowing your letters and being able to sound out words. Not one of them viewed reading as making meaning or comprehending text.  My students were already versed in the Discourse that reading is just sounding out words. I knew then that I would have to work very hard to help students realize that reading far extended sounding out letters. I knew I needed to teach them effective reading strategies beyond sounding out words and help my students to see the purpose of reading.

This chapter outlines how to teach students effective reading strategies and the importance of strategic instruction. First I want to share an anchor chart of reading strategies my students and I created last year.

This chart served as a reference during our skill based guided reading groups as well as our inquiry reading groups.  Eventually the students not only were able to repeat the chart but implement the strategies while reading.  Many students had already started second grade devaluing themselves as readers, but after an intensive focus on valuable reading strategies and miscue analysis; every student believed they were good readers. They didn’t view their mistakes as mistakes anymore- they were miscues. They began to learn how to articulate why they struggled with a particular word and why they read with ease during other times. I used RMA (retrospective miscue analysis) to record my students while reading, play back the session and discuss the session with each individual student. My focus was how to support each student in successful navigation of text and how to problem solve and think about what they were reading. I wanted students to ask themselves questions while reading. This reading reinforces the importance of strategic instruction but shares that no one program teaches teachers how to instruct accordingly. Our goal for students is to develop skills that enable them to critically think and problem solve in any given situation they encounter.  We want our students to be life time learners. If we teach our students to do these things, they can learn to apply their strategies in all areas of life; academic and personal. Strategic instruction involves helping students make sense of their world by teaching them the Discourse of a particular discipline. Therefore, when you ask your students what do good readers do? You want to them to respond with: They will ask does this make sense? Does this sound right when I read it in the sentence? I will use my world around me to help with words I may not understand.  There are many opportunities for teachers to demonstrate strategic learning. You can use mini lessons, shared reading, think alouds and discussion groups to model your thinking. I have found that this way of thinking and modeling has to be embedded into your daily instruction.  It has to become a part of your classroom culture. Make your thinking and their thinking visible.

Here are some questions that can enhance strategic learning for reading nonfiction text:

·         What do I need to do to make sure that I understand what I am reading?

·         Do I understand what I am reading?

·         How will I know that I understand what I am reading?

·         How will I know that I don’t understand what I am reading?

·         What can I do if I don’t understand?

Coupled with teaching students reading strategies, students must be taught and engaged in a way that ensures their learning experiences are long lasting that promote analysis, questioning and problem solving of text they encounter. (but that they can also apply these strategies in all areas of life)