How you can boost kids' reading comprehension A few years ago, most of our students at Lansdowne Elementary were struggling readers: while many could recognize words, half were unable to understand the stories they'd just read. Not surprisingly, these kids weren't interested in books. The problem wasn't Why Johnnie Can't Read, but more specifically, Why Johnnie Can't Understand—and the answer had a lot to do with poverty. Lansdowne is located in a poor part of Baltimore. More than 60 percent of its students qualify for free or reduced lunch. Many have learning disabilities and limited vocabularies. Thirty-four percent of their parents had their first child as teenagers and never finished high school. Many caregivers work two jobs or double shifts, leaving them with little time to help their children develop the literacy skills needed to succeed in school. In fact, a recent survey of our students found that only 14 percent of kindergartners to second graders say their parents read to them. How did our school turn this situation around? By recognizing that the teaching staff needed to overhaul the way it taught reading comprehension. Principal Anne Gold and I began researching teaching methods that improved reading comprehension and made reading more enjoyable. We found David Pearson's study, which appears in What Research Has to Say to the Teaching of Reading (International Reading Association, 1992), the most compelling research available: it proves that children can learn to understand and love reading if they're engaged in what they read. Essentially, the study shows that thoughtful, proficient readers make connections, draw upon prior knowledge, create visual imagery, make inferences, ask questions, determine important ideas, and synthesize what they read. The biggest challenge, however, was finding out if the techniques would work with our students. In the spring of 2003, Gold invited Debbie Miller, the author of Reading with Meaning: Teaching Comprehension in the Primary Grades (Stenhouse, 2002), to our school to create lessons that would incorporate these analytical skills for our first through third graders. Miller's book expands on Pearson's research by creating teaching strategies that address all of the components of a good reader. To prepare for Miller's visit, the staff read her book, as well as Strategies That Work: Teaching Comprehension to Enhance Understanding (Stenhouse, 2000) by Stephanie Harvey and Anne Goudvis. Miller used An Angel for Solomon Singer (Orchard, 1992) by Cynthia Rylant to demonstrate her strategies. Students were encouraged to ask questions about the picture book, which tells the story of a forlorn man from Indiana who now lives in New York City. Everyday the man frequents a restaurant, where the waiter acts like an angel by granting him his wishes. For example, Miller asked students why the story showed wheat fields in the middle of New York City. Students would then make inferences based on certain clues in the book. The purpose of the exercise wasn't to find answers, but rather to create a dialogue in the students' minds and among their peers. They were assured that there was no such thing as a dumb question. Kids were also asked to identify important themes, such as hopelessness, loneliness, and nostalgia. Were those themes repeated throughout the book or did they only occur in one scene? Miller showed students how to determine whether an idea was important. The purpose of the exercise was to get kids to develop a deeper understanding of the text. Students were then asked to make mental images based on their own life experiences, whether it was visiting tall skyscrapers in New York or having a meal at a diner. Miller then showed students how to make connections with the text, telling them there were three ways to share their life experiences with a book: the story could remind them of a personal experience (text-to-self), a world experience (text-to-world), or another book (text-to-text). Each time those connections were made, Miller and the students would write them down on Post-It notes and paste them to the part of the book where the connection was made. The ultimate goal was to "gradually release responsibility" so that these strategies became second nature to these reluctant readers. In order to be effective, these 90-minute reading strategies should take place every day, whether in the school library or in a classroom. Students should be given 20 minutes to read, 50 minutes to confer with a partner, and 20 minutes to share their insights with the entire class. Taught over the course of eight weeks, the lessons allow children to practice these strategies in small groups, in pairs, and independently. It also gives teachers time to teach, learn, and gauge the effectiveness of their lessons. Soon after Miller's visits, I used some of her teaching methods while reading the picture book In My Momma's Kitchen (HarperCollins/Amistad, 1999) by Jerdine Nolen to a second-grade class, pausing while children made connections to the story. Then they were asked to practice the exercises with a classmate. The results were amazing. Our apathetic readers eagerly waved their hands to share their connections. One particular student, Sam, who was reading below grade level, was suddenly interested in checking out more books. In three short months, he began to read at grade level. Because of the connections students forged with the text, even our least able readers were easily able to identify with a story's theme. And as their level of engagement increased, so did their comprehension of the story. How did we know this teaching method was really working? We tested 24 students who read below grade level with the unit tests included in our Houghton Mifflin reading series A Legacy of Literacy that measure students' comprehension of various reading passages. An amazing 96 percent of our students passed the tests. More than 50 percent of those kids would have failed the tests prior to our instruction. I knew that our staff would need support in implementing these changes, so I created a weekly discussion board, allowing teachers to communicate with each other at home or at school about their successes or failures and to share the wonderful lesson plans they were developing. I also created an Excel spreadsheet based on our state and county core curriculum in reading that allowed teachers to quickly and easily track students' progress. It's basically a data collection tool in which a teacher inputs information from a checklist into an easy-to-use rubric that assesses students' use of each of the strategies before, during, and after reading. After seeing the results from one lesson of instruction, we decided to begin a full-fledged program during the 2003 - 2004 school year. Nine teachers from kindergarten to fourth grade volunteered to participate in the program, with each class meeting at least once a day for three weeks for a minimum of 90 minutes each day. So far, progress has been phenomenal. About 90 percent of participants now pass the unit comprehension tests, and many of them are crazy about books. The library's book circulation has climbed 62 percent, and many kids even bring books to recess. Students aren't simply reading a greater number of books, they're reading longer and much more complex stories. And our library books are frequently returned stuffed with Post-It notes, covered with students' questions, connections, and inferences. Our program takes time and requires hard work and collaboration, but the results are well worth it. Here's a quick overview of how you can transform apathetic students into eager, active readers:

Five steps to creating a schoolwide program

1. Build a learning community for students and staff. Create an inviting environment. Rearrange chairs, sofas, small tables, lamps, and rugs in the media center and classroom to create a homey, welcoming environment conducive to reading. Schedule large blocks of time for reading. We completely reorganized our master schedule in order to allow all teachers to devote at least one hour and 45 minutes each day to reading. This block does not include phonics instruction or spelling, only reading. Provide books to support students' reading levels and interests and teach them how to choose age-appropriate titles. Teach students how to use the "Goldilocks and the Five Finger Rule" to see if a book is right for them. Here's how the rule works: a child reads one page of a book that he has selected. Each time the student encounters an unknown word, he holds up a finger. If he ends up raising five fingers, the book is too difficult for him and he should be encouraged to find another. (For more on helping children choose the right book, visit Baltimore County Public School's Bookfinder at www.bcps.org/offices/lis/models/bktalk/bookfinder.htm.) Communicate your passion for reading. Tell students about the books you love. I tell them how much reading means to me and how it helps me feel connected to other people, places, events, and great ideas. Help your staff become researchers. Teachers must also identify the root causes of students' learning problems by researching best practices for remedying the problems, implementing changes based on research, and collecting and analyzing data in order to assess the effectiveness of the changes, as well as to modify instruction by doing the following: Use research to provide a compelling case for your administrators and staff. The media specialist not only identifies and disseminates best practices, but she also teaches colleagues how to gather, analyze, and utilize current research. Our veteran teachers had never encountered this type of research and our newer teachers needed guidance and expertise in carrying out the research in their classrooms. Form partnerships with local universities. Through our partnership with the University of Maryland's Professional Development School, our teachers were able to take a graduate course crafted to meet the needs of our school. The course provided the framework, support, and professional guidance teachers needed, as well as an opportunity to earn graduate credit. The course also gave us a weekly opportunity to discuss the comprehension strategies that we were using and offered us guidance on how to collect and analyze data. Provide collaborative efforts with your colleagues. Opportunities for professional collaboration aren't just chance meetings in the hallway. 2. Provide direct instruction in reading strategies of proficient readers. Provide the staff with the latest research on best practices in reading. Every library media specialist should hold a basic membership in the International Reading Association. The IRA is a one-stop resource for current research about promising practices in reading instruction. (For more information, visit www.reading.org.) Show - not just tell - children how good readers read. Media specialists must actively model how readers connect to literature, ask questions, create visualizations, infer meanings, determine important ideas, and synthesize information. As the teacher's instructional partner, I made sure to reinforce and extend the instruction students received in the classroom. Provide opportunities for students to interact with the powerful, engaging literature in picture books. Why did we use picture books with fifth graders? Because they provide compelling narrative, powerful themes, and fully developed characterization in an engaging format that can be read aloud in 20 minutes or less. And no one in the building knows more about great picture books than a librarian. 3. Design ways that students can independently use comprehension skills. Create multiple opportunities for guided practice. Encourage students to practice daily on self-selected books. Gradually make students more responsible for using these strategies independently. For transfer of responsibility to take place, students must be given ample time for guided and independent practice. Craft lessons in which students must apply the strategies in real reading situations. Have students apply the strategies while reading in other content areas, such as science and social studies. 4. Teach teachers how to collect and analyze data in order to monitor and modify instruction. Instruct colleagues on how to collect what scientists refer to as "real-time" data. For data collection to meaningfully apply to instruction, it should be collected and analyzed frequently. Media specialists are information specialists and technology specialists, so they have the responsibility for simplifying data collection. Analyze data to improve instruction. Now that the No Child Left Behind act requires schools to provide evidence of student learning, it's important to collect data that can improve educators' teaching strategies and boost student achievement. Our program analyzes the test results of three groups of students: children from low socioeconomic groups, those with an Individualized Education Plan, and minority students who speak English as a second language. It's easy to create charts, like the one above, with Microsoft's Excel's AutoFilter, which lets teachers match the relevant information in their databases to key criteria. The chart shows the reading performance of a class of 24 second graders. The pre-instructional bars represent students' level of comprehension before they were shown how to make connections; the post-instructional bars represent their understanding of various passages six weeks later, after they were taught some of the comprehension techniques. A score of two and above is passing. As the chart demonstrates, after students learned how to make connections and pose questions, all of them passed the test. Even more surprising, students from affluent schools failed to reach this level of success. 5. Celebrate and share success. Teachers should record students' insights and share them with the entire class. Here are some insights from our second graders about the characteristics of good readers: "Think before, during and after reading," "Think of questions you don't know the answer to," and "Fiction is like making a movie in your head. Nonfiction is like taking photographs." When fifth graders were asked what they learned about themselves as readers, they answered: "I learned how to make meaningful inferences"; "I learned how to visualize the story in my head"; and "I learned how to 'get into a book' and 'read between the lines.'" Encourage teachers to share successful lessons, tips, and ideas. Few teachers realized what a wonderful job they were doing until another teacher and I complimented them. To be sure, these five steps will transform your teachers and students. Our new teachers are much more confident and know they can actively craft reading instruction for students with data to back it up. And Kathy Powell, one of our veteran teachers, now "loves to teach reading." As for our students, their reading comprehension scores have increased dramatically in all grade levels and among all groups. I no longer see blank, apathetic faces but a sea of hands waiting to share their connections, questions, visualizations, inferences, and syntheses.

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Author Information

Sharon Grimes is a media specialist at Lansdowne Elementary School in Baltimore, MD.