Comprehension

While reading with your child, pause every few pages to focus on comprehension. Some basic ideas for comprehension discussions include:

-connecting the text to a personal experience, another text that is similar, and/or a world occurance

("This reminds me of...")

-visualizing text scenes with sensory details / draw a quick sketch of what has happened so far without looking at the illustrations

("I can picture...," "If I were in this scene, I would see..., hear..., taste..., touch..., smell...")

-inferring/explaining character feelings and actions when not explicitly stated by the text

-predicting what may happen next

(make predictions throughout reading and confirm/disconfirm predictions as text evidence develops)

-reading with a question in mind and seeking answers from the text

("I wonder...") -

-retelling text events in detail (characters, setting, text events in sequential order, main problem, solution)

-identifying text genre

(fiction - realistic fiction, fantasy, mystery, science fiction, etc.)

(nonfiction - biography, informational, how-to, etc.)

-identifying how the illustrations support the text

-determining main ideas / details (when reading non-fiction texts)

-inferring the lesson of the book / the author's message