Reading Comprehension - Understanding the Message of a Text

Reading comprehension is the understanding of the message of a given text. It allows the person who reads to instantly capture the meaning of each word in the text as well as its underlying message. It is simply not just scanning the article being read. Instead, you need to exert time and effort in order to thoroughly understand what is being conveyed.

Reading comprehension is like your weapon. It enables you to formulate different meanings from the words in the text. It also helps readers in constructing different representations or ideas from what is being read.

By comprehending the messages of a given text, readers can easily answer any questions regarding the article. Although it requires tremendous time and effort, readers only need to understand the summary or the primary message being conveyed. The questions what, where, when, why and how help the readers to answer questions through comprehension.

Reading Comprehension Teaching Strategies

Certain strategies are being employed to help readers comprehend. Strategies and skills are not the same. A skill is a person's capability while a strategy is more of a mental or physical technique that helps individuals do a certain action. While skills are innate, strategies are not. A person should effectively use a particular strategy to make it work not just for the reader but for the audience as well.

There are different strategies being used by readers as well as teachers in comprehending texts. For teachers, it will be more beneficial to be open-minded in order to formulate further strategies or ideas for better understanding.

One of the most helpful strategies being employed by teachers is visualization. By creating mental images of the text being read, readers can easily discern the message of the text. Creating words into reality can also help in visualizing the article. It will be helpful for teachers to show images along with the text to easily get the message being conveyed.

Another strategy is through asking questions. This is done by asking the reader about what they remember from the story. This is also one way of asking the readers how they find the text they read.

Evaluation is also another strategy being employed by teachers, wherein readers are asked to analyze the context of the article. This will also determine if the readers understand the underlying message of the article. This approach is very helpful for readers in making judgment about the story being read.

Teachers could also ask the readers to find connections between the article being read and their daily lives. This will not only help the readers to fully comprehend the moral of the story but also help them apply it to their lives.

Lastly, teachers could also apply summarizing technique to the readers. From the word itself summarize, this approach involves intellectual and writing skills. With this approach, readers should be able to formulate what, when, where, why and how questions either on a piece of paper or in their minds.

Reading comprehension has evolved throughout the years. It helps students with their learning experience all over the globe. The success of literacy depends on reading institutes' capacity to provide better learning experience for readers. Thus, accuracy, appropriateness and expressiveness in reading fluency must be developed.

Although there are different strategies being employed, no one can still deny that literacy is one of the problems being face by some countries today. This is primarily caused by reading materials shortage and teacher's failure to use the reading strategies effectively.

Giving some reading comprehension needs of your child will really improve his/her skills. You certainly want him to improve in terms of learning and knowledge and as you also want the best for your child. Or you may try learning spelling.