Helping or Hurting Students' Reading and Comprehension Skill Abilities?

Educators implement researched-based reading strategies to support reading comprehension, and the reading strategies are not closing the literacy gap for many students (Bowman et al., 2018; Camilli et al., 2008). In the United States, the National Reading Panel (2000) is a framework which provides reading guidelines: phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension strategies to help educational institutions and educators effectively instruct reading comprehension.

Reflective Questions:

• Are current reading strategies helping or hindering student reading comprehension performance?

• Do students recognize connections between reading and writing?

Recommendations for Practice:

• Educators need an explicit, direct comprehension instructional method to develop, deepen, or enhance reading comprehension skills.

• Understanding oral and print language will help improve reading comprehension (Deacon & Kieffer, 2018).

References

Bowman, B. T., Comer, J. P., Johns, D. J., & Young, Y. C. (2018). Addressing the African

American achievement gap: Three leading educators issue a call to action. Young

Children, 73(2).

Camilli, G., Kim, S. H., & Vargas, S. (2008). A response to Steubing et al., “Effects of systematic phonics instruction is practically significant”: The origins of the national reading panel. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 16(15). https://doi.org/10.14507/epaa.v16n16.2008

Deacon, S., & Kieffer, M. (2018). Understanding how syntactic awareness contributes to reading comprehension: Evidence from mediation and longitudinal study models. Journal of Educational Psychology, 110(1), 72-86. https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000198