Teacher Practical Guidance:
Reading Comprehension Instruction
Category: Content
Rank Order
43
Effect Size
0.50
Achievement Gain %
19
How-To Strategies
Components of Comprehensive Comprehension Curriculum:
- Engaging content
- High level questioning and discussion
- Vocabulary and language development
- Use of graphic organizers
- Wide text range
- Collaborative learning
- Writing in response to text
- Explicit strategy instruction
- Gradual release of responsibility (Id, we do, you do)
Notice & Notes Signposts: Beers & Probst link\
- Contrasts and Contradictions: Sharp differences between what we expect characters to do, and what they actually do.
- Aha Moments: Realizations that shift characters’ actions or understanding.
- Tough Questions: Questions characters raise that reveal their inner struggles.
- Words of the Wiser: Advice or insights wiser characters offer about life.
- Again and Again: Events, images, or particular words that recur throughout a text or an essential portion of it.
- Memory Moments: Recollections by a character that interrupt the forward progress of the story
Comprehension Explicit Strategy Instruction:
- Inferential reasoning
- Rules for summarizing
- Chunking texts
- Auditory and language strategies
- Graphic organizers
- Comprehension questions
- Recall and summarization. Perplexity (2024)
Comprehension Strategies Effect-Size Data: Rowe (1985); Sencibaugh (2005)
Use of graphic organizers (1.71 effect size)
Auditory and language strategies (1.18 effect size)
Inferential reasoning (1.04 effect size)
Chunking texts (1.0 effect size)
Visually dependent strategies (0.94)
Summarization (0.86 effect size)
Repetition of concepts (0.77 effect size)Explicitness (0.70)
How-To Resources
Link – BOOK (Beers & Probst) Notice and Notes Signposts
Link – BOOK (Beer’s & Probst) We Read Non-Fiction Everyday
Link – GUIDE (MAISA) Literacy Essentials
Link – GUIDE (WWC) Foundational Skills: K-3
Link – GUIDE (WWC) Reading Comprehension: K-3
Link – GUIDE (EdWeek) Science of Reading
Link – VIDEO (WWC) Foundational Skills to Support Reading for Understanding
Link – WEBSITE (FCRR) Reading Database
Link – GUIDE (Educ Week) Reading Comprehension
Link – ARTICLE (Beer’s & Probst) Comprehension during whole-group literacy time
Link – ARTICLE (Heinemann) Small group literacy Interventions
Link – ARTICLE (Educ. Week) A Missing Link in the Science of Reading Conversation
References
Beer’s & Probst (2018). We read non-fiction every day. Heinemann Press. link
Beer’s & Probst (2015). Notice & note: Strategies for close reading. Heinemann Press. link
Filderman, M., et al (2019). A meta-analysis of the effects of reading comprehension interventions on the reading comprehension outcomes of struggling readings in 3rd-12th grades. Exceptional Children. 88(2). Link
Florida State University. Florida Center for Reading Research (FCRR). Link
Haller, E., et al (1988). Can comprehension be taught? A quantitative synthesis of metacognitive studies. Educational Researcher, 17(9).
IES What Works Clearinghouse (2019). Foundational Skills to Support Reading for Understanding: K-3. Link
IES What Works Clearinghouse (2010) Improving Reading Comprehension: K-3. Link
IES What Works Clearinghouse (2022) Providing Reading Intervention for Students grades 4-9. Link
MAISA (2023). Literacy Essentials. Link
Pressley et al. (1992). Verbal protocols of reading: The nature of constructively responsive reading. Mahwah: Erlbaum
Rowe, K. (1985). Factors affecting students’ progress in reading: Key findings from a longitudinal study. International Journal of Early Literacy, 1(2) Link
Sencibaugh, J. (2005). Meta-analysis of reading comprehension interventions for students with learning disabilities: Strategies and Implications. Link
Stahl, K. (2016) Today’s comprehension strategy instruction: “Not your father’s Oldsmobile.” in Duke & Taylor, (2016). Handbook of Effective Literacy Instruction. Guilford Press.
Suggate, S. (2014). Meta-analysis of the long-term effects of phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, and reading comprehension interventions. Journal of Learning Disabilities. 49(1). Link
Reading Comprehension
DEFINITION
Reading Comprehension is the process of simultaneously extracting and constructing meaning through interaction and involvement with written language. Rand Reading Study Group, 2002
DATA
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11 Meta-analysis reviews
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630 research studies
Hattie (2023) p. 249
QUOTES
“Intentional explicit teaching leads to the greatest impact on reading comprehension. Explicit teaching should include phonemic awareness, decoding skills (grades 1 and 2), then reading comprehension after.” Suggate (2014)
“Comprehension instruction is more complex than the instruction and assessment of the constrained skills of phonemic awareness, phonics and fluency. Comprehension is learned across a lifetime. It is never fully mastered because proficiency varies by text difficulty, genre task, and instructional context” Stahl (2016) p. 223