How do I know if my students are
understanding what they are reading?
Monitoring for Meaning is an umbrella strategy that
helps the teacher answer the following:
Are students understanding what they are reading?
 Do they know when they have lost meaning?
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Think-pair share: Sharing during literacy circles
 Ask two before me
 Vocabulary activities for challenging words
during the reading.
 Writing prompts
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Our students need to know that their questions
matter. They need to see us asking questions as
well as answering them.
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Asking questions engages us and keeps us
reading. A reader with no questions might just
as well abandon the book.
Q- chart
 Questioning bookmark
 Discussion questions
 Create their own chapter review questions
 Create discussion questions for their classmates
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Prior knowledge (in the form of schemata) influences
our comprehension to a much greater degree than
earlier research would have suggested... So powerful is
the influence of prior knowledge on comprehension that
Johnson and Pearson have found that prior knowledge
of topic is a better predictor of comprehension than is
either intelligence test score or reading achievement test
score."
 Since prior knowledge is essential for the
comprehension of new information, it is important to
make sure that you establish concrete connections to
new topics of study for your students.
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KWL Chart: Things I KNOW, WANT to know,
things I LEARNED before
 Reader response and bookmarks: How is the
character or action related to me?
 Text to self, text to text, text to world charts
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Being able to figure out what is important in a
given text is an essential skill for students to learn,
especially when dealing with the content-dense
nonfiction.
 Word Level –eyes focus longer on words that
carry the weight of the meaning
 Sentence Level- repetition, text features (bold
print, italics, graphs, figures, photographs) and
longer passages
 Whole –Text or Idea Level- Overall meaning of
text (after passing the other two levels)
We can help student focus in on central ideas by:
 “Getting to know your textbook” activity
 KWL chart
 Key word chart
 Note taking template
 Important events bookmark
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Helping students create mental images as they read can help
them better comprehend the content of the text and
remember it longer. As Keene and Zimmerman say in Mosaic
of Thought, "Proficient readers use images to draw
conclusions, to create distinct and unique interpretations of
the text, to recall details significant to the text, and to recall a
text after it has been read."
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When students combine their background knowledge with
the pictures they have generated from descriptive prose,
they put themselves into the book and bring the words to
life. When students turn abstract concepts such as size,
weight, length, distance and time into concrete pictures, they
come to a better understanding of these concepts.
Mental image title pages, covers, and posters
 Setting description and drawing worksheet
 Character traits worksheet
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Inferring is "reading between the lines," going
beyond the literal meaning in a text.
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It requires the reader to make a connection
between what is on the page and relevant prior
knowledge.
Picture walks
 Using context clues to infer: bookmarks
 Reader response
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In their study guide for Strategies that Work,
Stephanie Harvey explain:
"Synthesizing involves combining new information
with existing knowledge to form an original idea or
interpretation. Synthesizing lies on a continuum."
Summary worksheets
 Important events bookmarks
 Reader response worksheets
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"This book is an invitation to the reading dance
and shows you how to do the steps effectively.”
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“This book takes the best of reading
comprehension research and shows us how to
actively apply it to our own reading and how to
help children do the same."
THANK YOU!!!
Literature Circles
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Literature study provides opportunities to discuss how authors create and
craft quality literature. By choosing the literature and by recording their
responses and insights as they read, students take ownership of their learning.
They participate in reflective discussions about literature within supportive
group environments.
Purposes:
to develop personal responses to a text
to experience peer sharing of understandings, interpretations, and comments
about a text
to extend students' comprehension of literary selections
to involve students in discussion, negotiation, compromise and decisionmaking in a group setting
to develop appreciation of authors' styles
to develop good reading strategies
Duration:
4-5 weeks (every grading period)
Folder
 Assigned novels (according to last lexile)
 Contracts (signed by parents)
 Guided detailed instructions ( worksheets: title
page, character traits, setting, vocabulary, Summary,
and prompt with reflection/self evaluation )
 Rubrics: folder and culminating activity
 Mini strategy lessons (character traits)
 Assigned group culminating activity (Act out a
favorite scene of the novel)
 Formal Assessment for novels and poster
Notebook
 Assigned novels (according to their last lexile)
 Guided instructions (worksheet: instructions for
bookmarks, reading tasks, culminating activity, section
division, journal, team evaluation, and due dates.)
 Bookmarks: characters, questions, vocabulary, and plot
(one bookmark for each section)
 Rubrics for notebook and culminating activity
 Mini strategy lesson (questioning-use chart)
 Assigned group culminating activity ( 3D model of their
favorite scene with a written description and oral
presentation)
 Assessment: Book Jacket
Notebook
 Assigned novels (according to their last lexile)
 Guided instructions (worksheet: instructions for bookmarks,
reading tasks, section division, role descriptions and charts,
journal, team evaluation by director, and due dates)
 Bookmarks: character traits, questions, vocabulary, important
events, vocabulary, and connections (one bookmark for each
section)
 Rubrics for notebook and culminating activity
 Mini strategy lesson (making connections)
 Assigned group culminating activity (comic strip with oral
presentation)
 Assessment: booklet on Publisher (cover, characters/settings,
plot and summary, and closure paragraph-opinion, relation, and
recommendation)
Notebook
 Students choose among the books available. Lexile
groups vote and agree
 Guided instructions (worksheet: instructions for
bookmarks, reading tasks, section division, role
descriptions and charts, journal, team evaluation by
director, and due dates)
 Bookmarks: character traits with evidence, questions,
plot sequence, inferences, setting, and reflection
 Rubrics for notebook and culminating activity
 Mini strategy lesson (inference-use chart)
 Assigned group culminating activity (Life size character
model with novel knowledge.
 Assessment: Cereal Box Book Report
Notebook
 Students fill out choice ballots with three favorite.
 Assign groups with students from all three classrooms
 Assign novels to mixed groups.
 Guided instructions (worksheet: instructions for bookmarks,
reading tasks, section division, role descriptions and charts,
journal, team evaluation by director, and due dates)
 Bookmarks: character traits with evidence, setting (including
mood), major events, connections, and conflicts
 Rubrics for notebook and culminating activity
 Mini strategy lesson (conflicts, climax and synthesizing the
summary)
 Assigned group culminating activity (ATS Live show with
characters from the novel)
 Assessment: Formal 4 paragraph book report