A child may be a great decoder, but that's only one step toward becoming a fluent reader. Reading implies thinking and understanding, and teachers can help children develop strategies for comprehension. Children need to know how to make connections and ask questions, how to visualize and infer, how to extract important ideas and to synthesize information if they are to become fluent readers. Stephanie Harvey and Anne Goudvis show how teachers can model these strategies by thinking aloud and coding the text, lifting text onto the overhead and reasoning through it in class discussions, and bringing in their own books to model how adults use these strategies. All the while teachers give students long blocks of time to practice these strategies independently in their own reading.
Full of practical suggestions to help students think when they read, Strategies That Work gives teachers:
- more than forty K-8 strategy lessons for understanding text;
- ways to use short text, such as picture books, newspapers, magazines, and poetry to teach comprehension;
- ideas for choosing books that promote thinking and discussion;
- suggestions to better comprehend text in social studies, science, and other content areas;
- a wide range of authentic response options that promote engagement and enable students to monitor their own comprehension;
- examples of student work, illustrations, scripts of conversations, and a complete assessment interview to demonstrate and evaluate students' use of strategies.
Key features of Strategies That Work are the Appendixes that include:
- an authoritative bibliography of content-area text sets on the most common curricular topics in history, science, the arts, and literacy,
- • a list of favorite books teachers choose for introducing and guiding students in the practice of a given strategy;
- a list of professional journals that review books for classroom use and a list of great young adult magazines;
- • a selection of response options, homework suggestions, and authentic charts arranged by strategy.
Strategies That Work focuses on instruction that is responsive to kids' interests and learning needs. When readers use these strategies, they enjoy a more complete, thoughtful reading experience. Engagement is the goal. When kids are engaged in their reading they enhance their understanding, acquire information, and remember what they read. And best yet, they will want to read more!
