1. What makes a good reader? How do you know you are one?

2. 7 Effective Reading Strategies

3. Good Readers… use existing knowledge to make sense of new information.
ask questions before, during, and after reading.
draw inferences from the text.
monitor comprehension.
use “fix-up” strategies when meaning breaks down.
determine what is important.
synthesize information to create new meaning.

4. Use existing knowledge to make sense of new information

5. Relate what you know about a topic to what you read about the same topic.
Have you watched a television show or seen a movie about the topic? Recall specific details from the show or movie to understand the topic.
Have you talked about this same topic in another class or with someone else? Use that information to fill in the gaps about the text you are reading.

6. Ask questions before, during, and after reading

7. BEFORE ASK predicting questions.
WHO? WHAT? WHERE? WHEN? WHY?
DURING ASK about author’s purpose, main idea, organization, clarity, and supporting details.
AFTER ASK questions to draw conclusions, reflect, explain, retell, or summarize the text.

8. BEFORE
examples
DURING
AFTER
Predict using Who, What, Where, When, Why and How to start questions.
Do I know the meaning of this word?
How does this sentence fit with the others?
What are the major ideas?
What are the supporting details?
How is the information organized?
What is the author’s purpose?
Based on what you know, how would you explain the purpose of this text?
What conclusions can be made about the text?
How has my thinking changed after reading this text?

9. Draw inferences
clues
background knowledge

10. To INFER…
You use your personal knowledge plus the information you read to bring out new information about what you read.
You are able to understand things about the text that are not directly stated in the reading because you are making sense out of the information.
You are able to use the cause and effect relationship pattern as you read.

11. To INFER… Ask yourself a question about the text.
Look for important clues the author provides in the text.
Use your background knowledge to think about the clues given in the text.
Answer your question by putting together the text clues and your background knowledge.

12. Monitor Comprehension

13. Recognize AMBIGUOUS words—words that can have more than one meaning in a sentence. Know the correct meaning of the word so that you can interpret the sentence.
Locate misplaced sentences and reorganize them so that the text flows more logically.
Identify information that contradicts prior knowledge and decide whether the prior knowledge is accurate.
Check for sentences in the text that contradict later sentences. Use clues from the paragraph to decide which sentence is correct.
Determine irrelevant or unrelated information.

14. Use “fix-up” strategies when meaning breaks down

15. Make a connection between the text and
Your life.
Another text.
Your knowledge of the world.
Adjust your reading rate.
Make a prediction.
Notice patterns in text structure.
Re-read a word, phrase or chunk of text.
Retell what you’ve read in sequential order.
Stop and think about what you’ve already read.
Visualize the text.
Reflect in writing on what you have read.
Use print conventions.
Ask yourself a question and try to answer it.
Skip over text and continue reading to see if the meaning becomes clear.
Seek an expert source for clarification.

16. Determine what is important

17. Skim the text to determine the main ideas and key concepts or phrases connected to that main idea.
Establish why the author wrote the text and whether the purpose was accomplished.
Go directly to the text that supports your opinion or conclusion.
Use graphic organizers to follow text structure, to identify important ideas, and to summarize text.

18. Synthesize information to create new thinking

19. Shift perspective
Take the role of __________________
Play “devil’s advocate”
Argue a point
Invent something new
Propose an alternative
Conduct research
Revise your own thinking based on feedback
Consider new information

20. Works Cited
Tovani, Cris. I Read It, But I Don’t Get It: Comprehension Strategies for Adolescent Readers. Portland: Stenhouse Publishers, 2000.