Strategies To Support My Reading
O.W.L; Observe what is going on in the text, Wonder and question the text, Link the events to life.
Through this strategy the reader in constantly monitoring their own understanding. The reader is paying attention to the elements including the character (who), the setting (where), the time frame (when), the events, problem and attempted solutions. In addition, they are looking to question why events are happening or the reasons behind a characters actions. By linking the text, the reader synthesizes the information and makes it their own, which demonstrates and supports comprehension.
Reciprocal Reading; Predict, Clarify, Question, Summarize and Illustrate.
This strategy supports the various components of successful reading. By predicting they are activating prior knowledge and making assumptions based on an understanding of the world and the previous events in the text. Clarifying forces the reader to deal with new and unfamiliar vocabulary that they might otherwise read past. Questioning has the reader look at why events are happening and the reasons behind a characters actions. Summarizing develops the abiltiy to extract the most important parts of the text and put the events into the readers words. Illustrating is not about being a great artist. It supports comprehension, envisioning, as well as, the ability to pull out the most relevant information.
The Three I's of reading
This strategy supports comprehension of both fiction and nonfiction, although I personally find it to be most useful in nonfiction. The reader is challenged to seperate the information in the text into three catergories; Interesting, Irrelevant and Important. Often writers include information that is not always necessary for the reader to understand the main or central idea. This strategy asks the reader to identify the main idea and then seperate the details into three categories with a overall explanation behing their choices.
Fluency and Flow
It is important that a reader be able to read the text fluently, recognize and use punctuation appropriately, group ideas in text and decode words. This is a practiced skill and needs to be done aloud so that the reader has the opportunity to hear themselves. I have found that using an elbow joint (curved plastic pipe), looks like a phone available at any hardware store, really helps the reader to hear themselves and improve their fluency.
Stamina
Reading is not a race, it is a marathon. To be able to read for extended periods of time is necessary for success. Readers need to set goals that exceed expectations. If they are required to read for 45 minutes they should challenge themselves to read for 60. On average, when a reader is reading a book that is on their level they should be reading 3/4 of a page to 1 page per minute. Keeping a reading log that states the time and the pages read helps to measure and track their progress.