The Seven Keys to Comprehension: How to Help Your Kids Read It and Get It!

 

 

1. Create mental images:

Good readers create a wide range of visual,

auditory, and other sensory images as they read, and they become

 emotionally involved with what they read.

  

 

2. Use background knowledge:

Good readers use their relevant prior

knowledge before, during, and after reading to enhance their understanding

 of what they’re reading.

 

3. Ask questions:

Good readers generate questions before, during, and

after reading to clarify meaning, make predictions, and focus their attention

 on what’s important.

 

4. Make inferences:

Good readers use their prior knowledge and

information from what they read to make predictions, seek answers to

 questions, draw conclusions, and create interpretations that deepen their

 understanding of the text.

 

 

5. Determine the most important ideas or themes:
Good readers identify key ideas or themes as they read, and they can distinguish

 between important and unimportant information.

 

 

 6. Synthesize information:

Good readers track their thinking as it

evolves during reading, to get the overall meaning.

 

 

 7. Use fix up strategies:

Good readers are aware of when they

 understand and when they don’t. If they have trouble understanding

specific words, phrases, or longer passages, they use a wide range of

problem-solving strategies including skipping ahead, rereading, asking

questions, using a dictionary, and reading the passage aloud.

Good readers use the same strategies whether they’re reading Reader’s Digest or a calculus textbook.

There is nothing fancy about these strategies. They are common sense. But to read well, readers must use them.