Got Reading Comprehension? Pass It On.
By Mark W.F. Condon, Unite for Literacy vice president
The ability to understand book characters’ points of view is fundamental to higher-level reading comprehension. So, how might we teach that to new readers?
Babies seem to be born with a natural empathetic response and building upon that is a good place to start long before formal schooling begins. When babies see another baby cry, they may start crying in harmony, or if they see someone laughing, they may smile and giggle despite not getting a joke at all. Every day when parents or caregivers read with children, or guide them through lessons, they can demonstrate that reading experiences are unique to each of us.
For lifelong avid readers, subject matter choices come from our own tastes and felt needs. For example, outside of school or work, a person may read mystery thriller novels, cultural anthropology magazines, and home improvement websites. This reading is not assigned to them. Rather, they read because these resources are interesting, relevant, and perhaps even loved by the reader.
This literacy outcome suggests that early guidance and instruction should focus not on low-level understandings of word meanings, plots and facts, but quite the opposite. Adult guidance most productively starts with nurturing higher-level comprehension, namely, what each child’s book experiences mean to them.
Higher-level comprehension is nurtured when children are invited to share their perspectives and when they’re asked:
• How a particular event or idea might tickle their curiosity. “So, what do you think that meant? What does it mean to you?”
• How the book connects to their family life. “What does that remind you of?”
• How those observations make them react emotionally. “How do you feel when you think about that?”
• Why certain characters, illustrations, and whole books are their favorites. “So, why is that picture your favorite? What do you like about it?”
Asking questions like these prompts children to share their very personal connections to what’s read. It engages them in a story, inquiry, or exploration.
As mature readers, we need to show them how, in understanding a story event, we automatically find ourselves emotionally assuming the roles of characters. While reading, we might find ourselves reacting as if we were the character in the situation or interaction they encounter. For example, our facial expressions change—we smile or get agitated. We even shrug and make gestures to go with what a character says, just as if we were saying or hearing it. Kids need to see us doing this to understand the depth of pleasure available from engaging with what we read.
Consider if we read with a child about an anthropologist’s spade clinking on something while she digs into some soil. When we actually read that, it sparked a memory of the time we were planting flowers in our backyard and our trowel clinked on what we thought was another darned rock. So we share with the child: “When we brushed the mud off that ‘rock’ we discovered that it was an ancient native inhabitant’s hand-crafted arrowhead!” Together we naturally wondered aloud: “Where did this come from? Who released that arrow and at what or at whom?” and so on. Readers thus become personally invested in the content, emotionally placing ourselves with the ancient hunter and the child is transformed into an anthropologist making that surprise discovery. It is the memory of such discoveries in reading that enrich expectations in the selection of subsequent books as readers anticipate the thrill they enjoyed in their prior reading.
So, it is essential to show little ones how we give ourselves up to the events and interactions in books just as we do with encounters in life. When they see our glee, they will want it for themselves. In time, such personal comprehension, the highest kind there is, will naturally become children’s reading goal.