Reading comprehension being a skill, needs practice in order to attain mastery. But, in order to do same, a properly organized plan needs to be established.
You should be able to inculcate the habit in your child to Devote enough time and energy in both "guided" and "relaxed" reading routine practice for at least two to three hours a week. Guided practice would require focus and meticulousness, this would also involve learning of new vocabulary followed by a quick self-test, whereas relaxed reading would require you to merely read and enjoy the practice of reading without any stress. This would not only calm you down, but also help you increase your reading speed which would be beneficial in the short as well as long run!
So here are few must-to-do steps in order to improve your reading comprehension skills and help you with your exams and daily life!
Step 1: Comprehend, not only the passages, but also your child’s style of reading, and Re-evaluate the same
In order to improve anything, be a skill, or any aspect of life, you need to first comprehend your kid’s present situation. This would allow you to analyse the level of your kid and let you gauge about the amount of hard work that is require in order to attain the desired goal. This would also let you set your ward’s bench marks for short run and long run too.
Start by selecting excerpts from different texts with which you child is unfamiliar—text books, essays, novels, news reports, or any kind of text you feel you particularly struggle to understand—and let your kid read them as you would normally. while your child does the reading, try to understand the amount of attention that he or she is able to pay in the same passage, and the time and energy that it requires to stay focused.
If you see that your kid’s concentration tends to lag after a period of time, start to slowly build up the stamina of your ward. For instance, if your child continually lose focus at the 15 minute mark every time he or she reads, acknowledge this and push your kid to slowly increase that time. Begin by letting your kid read for maximum amount of focused time, and then give him or her a break. Next time, try for 17 minutes. Once your child has mastered that, try for 20 and see if your ward can still maintain focus. If yes then try for 25.
Step 2: Try and build up your child’s Vocabulary
Reading and understanding the passage depend primarily on vocabulary, context, and the interaction of words. So in order to understand the whole text, your child needs to understand each of the elements exclusively.
If you find that your child is struggling to understand specific vocabulary, it's possible that he or she is picking up the meaning through context clues, but it’s always advisable to look up the definitions of words with which your ward is not aware of. As your child reads, make sure to maintain a proper list of those words that your ward is either not able to recognise in the first go, or isn’t aware of at all! And you must dedicate around 20-25 mins with your ward to go though the vocabulary after consulting dictionary.
Step 3: Read for Pleasure
The best way to improve your ward’s reading comprehension level is through practice. And the best way to practice is to have fun with it!
Make reading a fun loving activity!
This will motivate you to not only keep yourself in contact with text, but would also boost up your confidence in reading, writing and lastly speaking.
Prefer to let your ward read the texts which are easy to comprehend. Since you have already started making your child practice daily and now you know your child’s levels, it would be easy for you to judge the best suitable level for your child’s reading. This would take off the pressure on top of your ward and he or she would soon enough start enjoying the activity and soon you'll find that your child’s reading comprehension levels will improve over time.
SOME PRACTICE COMPREHENSIONS REFERENCES.
For Practicing Unseen Passage for Class 6 one can visit website https://www.ribblu.com/index.php/cbse/papers/class-6/english/9