5 Teacher Tested Reading Strategies you Could Implement Tomorrow

Welcome to the inaugural post from ELA Matters, a collaborative blog focused on all matters of English Language Arts! We are a group of middle and high school educators working together to share our ideas and expertise with the secondary ELA world.

Below you’ll find a list of our top 5 favorite reading strategies for improving reading comprehension and increasing student engagement. Reading strategies include independent reading, inferencing, stop ‘n jot, annotation, and anticipation guides.

Leave a comment to tell us what you think, ask a question, or give us some encouragement 🙂 Be sure to enter the giveaway at the end of the post!

Reading Strategy #1: Independent Reading

Jen Strawser from The Supported Teacher says “independent reading is — hands-down — my favorite reading strategy to use with my secondary ELA students.”

There are many other names for independent reading in the classroom – “Silent Sustained Reading” (SSR), “Drop Everything and Read” (DEAR), “Free Uninterrupted Reading” (FUR), “Uninterrupted Sustained Silent Reading” (USSR), “Daily Independent Reading Time” (DIRT), Million Minutes Challenge, and more.

Independent reading is an activity in which students read a book of their choice for a set period of time each day. The goals of independent reading are promoting student choice and independence, improving reading comprehension, and fostering a love of reading in the hopes that students will become lifelong learners. 

In addition, independent reading supports equity and social justice in the classroom. 

While we may not have control over the curriculum we’re required to teach, we can ensure our classroom and school libraries are stocked with books by diverse authors. Independent reading provides students with the choice and freedom to read texts written by diverse authors with diverse perspectives.

Here’s how Jen implements independent reading in her classroom (and how you can too!)

Start with a “book interview” activity

I teach students how to choose appropriate and engaging texts for themselves. This often a skill teachers overlook and students lack, which can lead to frustration on both sides when implementing independent reading. 

Truly, truly, TRULY let students choose their own texts 

…And I respect the choices they make. Over the years, I’ve had students read graphic novels, cartoons (Calvin and Hobbes for teaching inference skills anyone??), dramas, short story collections, poetry and verse novels, driver’s license handbooks, auto mechanic how-to books, music magazines, and texts in other languages. All reading is good reading. 

Give students the first 10 minutes of every class period

I provide students with a Monthly Reading Log that includes a list of Active Reading Strategies on the back. Students use the reading log to record a single sentence about their reading. And that’s it! Because independent reading is about developing a love for reading and a lifelong reading habit. 

And last… let students share! 

Once a week, students end independent reading time by sharing with a partner what they read. On the last Friday of each month, students push their desks into one giant circle. We move around the circle sharing the title of our book, a quick synopsis (no spoilers!), and what we like or don’t like about the book. 

Reading Strategy #2: Stop’N Jot

A reading strategy that all students can be successful with is a Stop ‘N Jot!  Carolyn from Middle School Café was introduced to this strategy a few years ago by her co-teacher. You may have seen this strategy used in other subject areas as a learning tool for students to reflect on their learning, but Stop ‘N Jots are also useful in an ELA classroom to improve student comprehension and increase engagement in class discussions.

Stop ‘N Jots are great because the strategy gives all students the opportunity to pause, think, then write and/or draw about what they’ve just read.  This allows processing time for students and increases engagement in discussions and deepens comprehension. 

Introducing Stop N Jot to your class

When Carolyn introduces this strategy to her middle school students, she begins by using short stories.  Students read one page of a story, pause, think and then students essentially do a brain dump of everything they can remember from that page of the story.  Students will continue with this process until the end of the story. 

At the end of the story, students have information written down and have already begun to reflect on what they’ve read.  This makes it easier for students to participate in class discussions because they have been given the time to process what they’ve read. Because students have taken the needed time to process what they’ve read, they remember more of the story. 

Once students have the strategy down, Carolyn uses his strategy with larger texts such as novels.  When using Stop ‘N Jots with novels, students read a few chapters instead of just a page.  Then think and write/draw about what they’ve just read.  Carolyn has seen an increase in engagement in class and small group discussions when students complete the Stop ‘N Jot prior to the discussion.

Stop ‘N Jots are useful in an ELA classroom to improve student comprehension and increase engagement in class discussions.

This strategy is especially useful for students on IEP’s, as well as ELL students as it gives them the needed time to process what they just read before having to talk about it.

Reading Strategy #3: Inferencing

Lesa from SmithTeaches9to12 says teaching inferencing is her top reading strategy. Why? Because it’s the skill to build all other skills in ELA and beyond.

So how to teach it? 

Lesa has students focus on three-steps:

1. Ask questions of the text. What do I already know about the topic? What do I understand about the text (read or viewed)?
2. What else could this mean? Why do I think this? What leads me to this interpretation?
3. Practice, PRACTICE, PRACTICE!

(CLICK HERE for a classroom poster with these steps.)

That third step is the most important since we all get better when we practice. 

Inferencing is included in a variety of ways in Lesa’s classroom. Here are two activities that you might want to use in yours too.

ACTIVITY 1 – GROCERY RECEIPT ANALYSIS – FREE TEMPLATE HERE. 

Collect random receipts all the time for this activity. (I’m the lady in the grocery store who will sometimes, when the line isn’t long, randomly group different items for separate purchases just to create a unique receipt for this activity!) Don’t have receipts on hand? Google “receipts” to find plenty of options you can use.

Add a receipt to the template, place the posters around the room (or now digitally on different slides in a shared slideshow), and have students write what they think the items imply about a character. I might ask:

“If someone bought a kale salad, 4-pack of yoghurt, and some bulk jujubes at 8 pm on a Friday, what might this say about them?”

Students shift to different receipts to add additional layers of understanding and connections between the receipt and their imagined character making sure to justify their connections along the way (often that’s circling the ‘evidence’ and drawing a line to their explanation). 

ACTIVITY 2 – PHOTO ANALYSIS ACTIVITY

For this activity, supply students with images on different slides and ask questions with a particular structure. The goal is to practice the steps of inferencing so it becomes “second-nature” when they’re reading or viewing something in class. 

Pixabay and Unsplash are great resources for royalty-free images. As a first step, have students complete this activity with supplied images and a next step would be to have them create their own slides with images from the sites. Their creations can then be used in future classes (the prep is done for you and students learn along the way – double bonus!) 

If you’re looking to introduce inferencing skills into your classroom check out this ready-made introductory lesson from SmithTeaches9to12.

Don’t forget to enter the giveaway! Three opportunities to enter. Details at end of post.

Reading Strategy #4: Anticipation Guides

Let’s talk anticipation guides! Ashleigh Dillow from ashleigh.educates says “if you haven’t incorporated anticipation guides into your reading strategies, you should definitely give them a try.”

The purpose of using anticipation guides is to activate prior knowledge and build curiosity about a text. This can be done with short stories, novels, informational text and more.

Using anticipation guides engages your students by providing hints about the text and enables them to question how each statement relates to what they will be reading.

For example, one of your statements might be, money equals happiness. Your students would first decide if they agree or disagree with that statement and then explain their reasoning. Some students might argue that if they had tons of money, they would be happy, while others might argue that material possessions only provide temporary happiness…

The best part? There is no right or wrong answer!

Students just need to be able to explain their answers and be open minded to the opinions of their peers.

So how do you create anticipation guides?

Start by thinking of five to ten general statements or misconceptions pertaining to an assigned text. Next, allow students to decide if they agree or disagree with each statement.

Finally, have students explain their reasoning. Students may feel differently based on how they perceive the statement as well as their life experiences.

There are many variations and ways to utilize anticipation guides: they can be used as pre-reading, during reading or post reading activities.

Not a huge fan of paper and pencil anticipation guides?

No problem! Ashleigh from ashleigh.educates suggests getting your students up and moving by labeling one side of the room AGREE and the other side of the room DISAGREE.

Students can then move around the room and defend their claims aloud. This method engages students and sparks interesting class discussions!

Whether on paper or aloud, anticipation guides are a great way to introduce a new text. There are lots of opportunities to put your own spin on a traditional strategy and make reading more enjoyable for your students!

While you’re here, grab this free anticipation guide template from ashleigh.educates and see where the discussion takes you and your students!

Reading Strategy #5: Annotation

Samantha from Samantha in Secondary suggests using annotation to keep students engaged in their reading.

Annotation uses a combination of active reading strategies in which students can engage while they are reading.

For my personal brand of annotation, I use a simple four-step process that helps students annotate text. I teach this method at the beginning of each new course and keep a poster of the strategy on the wall for them to refer to each time we read a new text.

This method works with both fiction and non-fiction texts, but the line of questioning changes slightly.

Here is the process:

• During the students’ first read, they should underline all unknown words. They should infer the meaning of the words without stopping. Once the first read is finished, students should go back and define all of the words they didn’t know. (For a digital option, I have students put the definitions in a comment in Google Docs.)
• Next, students should highlight important information. For a fiction piece, I lead them to highlight only the main parts of the plot diagram. In non-fiction, I ask them to highlight for purpose and either stick to highlighting the author’s main argument or only the most important facts. I emphasize intentionality with highlighting.
• In the left margin, I have students stop and summarize as they read. This allows them to go back and find important information as needed. I ask the students, “What is the author SAYING?”
• In the right margin, I ask the students, “What is the author DOING?” For fiction pieces, the author might use more figurative language and narrative elements whereas in an argumentative piece, an author might use more rhetorical strategies. For this, I always do a lot of pre-teaching and modeling to make sure the students are able to see what this kind of upper-level thinking should look like.

There are many ways to teach annotation, but in my experience, this one has been the most successful. 

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