Reading and Listening

Comprehension
 Reading without comprehension or understanding is
not reading. Many children can pronounce words
fluently but asked what they have just read, they are
unable to respond. Although they may score high in
teams of reading rate or fluency, they are
not really
Good readers.
 What makes you a good
reader.
A good reader is someone who has a purpose for reading, whether
it is to look for specific information or to read for pleasure. A good
reader is involved in a Complicated thinking process as she/he
reads. These are strategies that we can Teach children to help
them become purpose full, active readers. Research has Shown
that readers who receive explicit instruction in these strategies
make Significant gains on reading comprehension tests. These
strategies include setting purposes for reading, Making
Productions, motivating reading and realizing when Something is
not making sense, questioning during reading, making mental
pictures of what is being read, understanding story structure, and
summarizing what is read.
 Make Predictions

Prediction encourage active reading and keep children

interested, weather or not the predictions are correct.
Instruct Children:
 Look at the pictures, table of contents, chapter headings,
maps, diagrams, and features. What subjects are in the
book?
 Write down predictions about the text. During reading,
look
for words or phases from those predictions.
 While reading, revise the predictions or make new ones.
 Visualize

Many children think visually, using shape, spatial relationships, movement,

and colours, and can benefit greatly from visualizing what is happening as
they read.
 From a picture of character or the setting in your mind. Add details to
writer’s description.
 Imagine a friction story is like a movie taking place in your head.
Imagine the characters’ features. Picture the plot in the time and
space.
 Imagine processes and explanations happening visually. Use nouns,
verbs, and adjectives to create pictures, diagrams, or other mental
images.
 Use the graphic organizers to show information. Make sketches or
diagrams on scrap paper.
 Ask and Answer Questions

Having children from their own questions helps them recognize

confusion and encourages active learning.
Instruct Children:
 Before reading, think about the subject based on the title,
chapter heads, and visual information. Make note of
anything you are curious about.
 While reading, pause and think about or write down any
questions. Be sure to ask questions if you are confused or
unsure of something.
 Look for the answers while reading. Pause and write
down
the answers.
 Were all the questions answered? Could the answers come
from other sourses?
 WRITING
What Is Writing?
 Writing is “thinking with a pencil”
 Writing is a premier way in which children think and
express
their ideas
 Writing is a way children express creativity,
uniqueness, and
indicate what they want
 Writing well and succinctly is increasingly important as
children
get older
 Elements of good instruction

 An environment that supports writing (with space for children

to
write and the tools to do so)
 Teachers who read with a ‘writer’s eye’ (so they can point out
strategies that young writers used effectively)
 Teachers who model good instruction (so children will see how
one goes about writing)
 Lots of opportunities to practice, accompanied by corrective
feedback (praise the expressive aspect of the task, while
helping
the child form letters and write accurately and well)
Current challenges in the field

 Schools of education need to offer pre-service

teachers
experience in learning what good writing is,
how to
teach writing,
and knowledge about the genres of writing (e.g.,
expository vs. narrative writing )
 Schools need a greater focus on evaluation, so
we can
identify
good writing and support children as they develop
their skills
Automatic operations of writing

 Writing is like juggling a lot of balls in the air

 If you have automatic mastery of some of the basics,
you can focus more attention on the demanding
complex
reasoning skills
 Spelling
 Too often seen as the “poor relation” of language arts
instruction
 Accurate spelling is a courtesy to the reader
 Spelling knowledge is very closely associated with reading
comprehension. Spelling is a way of being ‘word
conscious,’ which is associated with knowing word
meaning and comprehension — which results in better
writing
 Those who spell well are more likely to write longer and
better structured compositions as they move into the
higher levels of
written expression
When do spelling errors denote a problem?

Individual aptitude for spelling varies. However, poor spelling is a

hallmark of dyslexia. Watch for:
 difficulty beginning to emerge from first grade on inability
to spell the highest-frequency words
 continued invented spelling even after good instruction and
practice
 spelling words in a dysphonic way (with little
correspondence between the sounds that are in a word and
the spelling)
 inability to remember a letter sequence and difficulty with
speech sounds
 lack of strategies for thinking about words
 Listening

“Listening comprehension refers to the understanding of

the implications and explicit meanings of words and
sentences of spoken language.”

Listening Comprehension (receptive language) is basically

how well one understands what is being conveyed and has
two distinct parts:
 Perception: perceiving the signal as it is given
 Comprehension: understanding of the message
conveyed.
Listening Comprehension Skills

 Auditory Attention

 Auditory Memory

 Auditory Perception

 Comprehension - making connections to previous

learning

Attention and memory are skills necessary for

perception and comprehension to occur.
 Listening Comprehension:
Classroom Examples
Throughout the school day, students must be able to…
 follow directions, which requires:
 listening to direction/s (single or multiple steps)
 keeping direction/s in mind
 executing direction/s
 comprehend questions (synthesize/understand
questions related to academic content)
 listen and comprehend in order to learn (oral
presentation of stories, lectures, classroom dialogue,
etc.)
* Behavior difficulties may be an indication of difficulty
with listening comprehension.
Brain activation for reading and listening comprehension:
An fMRI study of modality effects and individual
differences in language comprehension

The study compared the brain activation patterns associated

with the comprehension of written and spoken Portuguese
sentences. An fMRI study measured brain activity while
participants read and listened to sentences about general
world knowledge. Participants had to decide if the sentences
were true or false. To mirror the transient nature of spoken
sentences, visual input was
presented in rapid serial visual presentation format. The
results showed a common core of amoral left inferior frontal
and middle temporal gyri activation, as well as modality
specific c brain activation associated with listening and
reading comprehension
Reading comprehension was associated with more left-lateralized
activation and with left inferior occipital cortex (including fusiform
gyrus) activation. Listening comprehension was associated with
extensive bilateral temporal cortex activation and more overall
activation of the whole cortex.

Readers with lower working memory capacity showed more

activation of right-hemisphere areas (spill over of activation) and
more activation in the prefrontal cortex, potentially associated
with more demand placed on executive control processes. The
activation of this network may be associated with phonological
rehearsal of linguistic information when reading text presented in
rapid serial visual format.
 CONCLUSION
The connection between reading and writing is strong and well
accepted by many educators (Routman, 2003; Tierney &
Pearson, 1983). Reading and writing need to be integrated to
improve the quality of each. Writing summaries, examining texts
from multiple perspectives, utilizing graphic organizers, and
making use of discussion journals are valuable tools for linking
reading and writing to strengthen student comprehension.
Gammill (2006) states “Writing to learn, to build comprehension
and understanding, is a method any teacher in any area can
implement and use successfully with students”. The four writing
strategies discussed in this article are ones teachers can use in
any subject area to help their students gain more from texts and
help them build their comprehension skills.