This is a generative list of suggestions for reading instruction. If you want a more detailed presentation, I have copies of the Nist and Holschuh essay.
Metacognitive, cognitive, and affective elements are necessary for successful teaching/learning.
Cognitive: As readers,we all need a schema that “provides ideational scaffolding” and permits prioritizing information, inference making, memory searches and summarizing (79). Affective: As readers it’s important that we structure assignments to provide choice, challenge, peer interaction, belief in value of multiple perspectives and internal source of knowledge.
“Students need to be taught explicitly a repertoire of strategies and receive instruction on how to apply them” (85). Direction instruction of strategies should
- begin with a concrete and complete explanation of it
- give an explanation of why it should be learned
- provide instruction on how to use the strategy, including
* teacher modeling (thinking aloud regarding various reading strategies)
* examples to demonstrate use of strategy in a variety of contexts
* guidance in practicing the strategy
* evaluation of strategy use through both teacher feedback and self-monitoring
Strategies (must include cognitive, metacognitive, and affective dimensions, especially connecting to students’ own knowledge):
- Graphic organizers
- Concept mapping
- Previewing text (problem is how to get students to do it on their own)
- Underlining and highlighting (only useful if it’s the first step in annotation and concept mapping; difficulties include finding what’s truly important)
- Annotation (includes “writing brief summaries in the text margins in the students’ own words, enumerating multiple ideas (e.g., cause-effect relations, characteristics), noting examples in the margins, putting information on graphs and charts if appropriate, marking possible test questions, noting confusing ideas with a question mark in the margins, and selectively underlining key words or phrases” (91); should also include challenging author, identifying assumptions, relating other possible perspectives, considering implications, applying the idea to a new situation)
- Elaborative interrogation (asking questions of the text–best modeled by teacher, then self-questioning)
- Elaborative verbal rehearsals (a bit like SQ3R): “Relating ideas across text and to prior knowledge, incorporating personal reactions or opinions about the ideas, summarizing key ideas in students’ own words, and including appropriate text examples” (93)
- Self-testing (individual or cooperative to identify what the student knows and doesn’t know; possibly collaborative brainstorm and answer potential test questions at beginning of class)
Students need direct instruction followed by scaffolding till they learn the strategy and help in learning when to use which strategies (going meta on the process).
It may be helpful to have students see the effects of trying a technique and then NOT using it in order to discover how they best understand a text–in other words, adopting an approach of experimentation, not rigid following of reading rules.
*This material is taken from Sherrie L. Nist and Jodi L. Holschuh. “Comprehension Strategies at the College Level.” In Rona F. Flippo and David C. Caverly, eds. Handbook of College Reading and Study Strategy Research. Mahway, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers, 2000. 75-104.