Archive for Comprehension

In 1978, researcher Dolores Durkin published a study describing how teachers taught students to understand what they read (“What Classroom Observations Reveal About Reading Comprehension Instruction”). Her finding: They didn’t. Durkin concluded that the teachers she studied offered almost no comprehension instruction. Instead of showing students how to understand what they read, teachers assigned and tested. Often, education research doesn’t have a direct and immediate effect on what actually goes on in classrooms, but this study did. Educators began to consider more carefully how to teach students what skilled readers, writers and thinkers do when they read, write and think. Read more of this commentary by Eileen Landay in The Providence Journal.

Reading and writing instruction must be included in all academic areas if literacy is to improve to levels that will ensure the nation’s middle and high school students are prepared for success in college, work, and citizenship, according to a new report from the Alliance for Excellent Education. Literacy Instruction in the Content Areas: Getting to the Core of Middle and High School Improvement argues that the acceptable standard for all students must exceed simply reading at grade level. Only advanced reading skills will truly prepare students to meet the challenges of education beyond high school, the needs of the workplace, and the demands of the 21st century.

Teens who plan to prep for college-admissions tests this summer can find a plethora of ways to make it fun and flexible. Want to study in the shower? Lose yourself in a comic book? Take a quiz on your iPod? Or how about rocking out to some songs that stretch the lyrics just a tad in order to be educational? Read about these test prep options in this article from The Christian Science Monitor.

Students who study while they chat on the phone, wander websites, send instant messages, watch TV, or listen to music will learn differently and probably not as effectively as they would without those distractions, according to new research.

An Australian researchers finds that children's language development is greatly aided when parents occasionally stop reading to let children comment about a book they're reading together.

But another expert says don't overdo the quiet—talking in general helps.

E.D. Hirsch argues in this opinion piece that without adequate general knowledge, kids will find reading stressful and unrewarding as they get older and encounter more challenging texts.

“The evidence is clear: Reading comprehension depends largely on knowledge.”

So argues best-selling author E.D. Hirsch, Jr., in his new book, Building Knowledge: The Case for Bringing Content into the Language Arts Block and for a Knowledge-Rich Curriculum Core for All Children. Read a review and a series of related essays in the Spring 2006 issue of American Educator.