English Developmental Continuum P-10 – Reading
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- Indicators of Progress
- Text characteristics
- Teaching Strategies for Fiction texts
- Teaching Strategies for Non Fiction texts
Indicators of Progress
- Students describe their reading plan, for example, when reading a text, they first try to decide the likely topic, and suggest words, phrases and ideas that the text might say and questions the text might answer. They say where they might pause while reading, how they might update or review what they know having read the text, and what they might do if what they read does not make sense.
- Students read the text independently, either silently or aloud as appropriate; they may switch from one mode to the other if necessary for comprehension or other communication purposes.
- Students work out the meanings of unfamiliar words in less redundant contexts by using text information and by linking the unfamiliar words and phrases with synonyms.
- Students use a more complex paraphrasing strategy; they paraphrase sentences that have embedded clauses and paraphrase sentences that refer to two events.
- Students paraphrase or retell a paragraph in a chapter while reading and then predict following ideas. They discuss why saying a sentence another way is a useful comprehending action while reading.
- Students visualise or imagine a sentence they have read and describe what the sentence evokes
- Students show literal comprehension by paraphrasing a text, retelling the main ideas, answering questions about ideas mentioned explicitly in sentences, selecting accurate rewordings of the texts, and identifying the words used in a text to describe particular characters and events.
- Students show inferential comprehension, for example, they recognise and link cause and effect or consequences that are specified across a sequence of sentences within a paragraph, infer the events that may have happened earlier and match paraphrases or restatements of descriptions of characters and events in a text of several paragraphs.
- Students evaluate descriptions of particular characters and events in terms of the reader’s feelings, for example, How would you have felt if you were Harry being punished for what happened in the reptile house?
- Students suggest the author’s purpose for writing the text and how well it achieved its purpose, for example, Did a text that was intended to scare/amuse readers actually do this?
- Students talk about the actions they use while reading to help themselves to read.
- Students describe how reading helps them and is a useful activity, for example, to discover what other people are thinking, and to teach new ideas efficiently.
- For informational text with two discrete sets of separate facts presented in a list of dot-point format, they can: (1) answer literal questions that require linking or comparing data within or across the two sets; and (2) link a short paragraph with a diagram or set of diagrams, for example, by completing a cloze.
Text Characteristics
Language
- Descriptive words and phrases appearing
- Some specific terminology used with support
- Mainly simple sentences with more compound sentences appearing
- The balance between natural language and book language shifts towards book language
- Increased use of direct speech to carry action
- Use of first person appearing
Layout
- 'readable' chunks of texts created through organisational features
- Print size may be smaller but mainly medium sized text
- Purpose of illustrations moving away from text support into breaking up text into 'readable' chunks
- Several sentences in one paragraph, containing more than one idea
- Longer chapters appearing
- Headings, subheadings, page breaks and clear paragraph breaks emerging
- Subheadings contain several ideas
- Contents page containing some detail
- Simple glossary containing some detail
Content
- Clear beginning, several ideas in the middle, clear ending in story structure
- Main ideas linked, can become more complex but with one main theme
- Characters developing in greater detail, sometimes with thoughts and feelings beginning to add depth
- Less familiar concepts appearing, supported by familiar vocabulary
Teaching Strategies for Fiction texts
Before Reading: Getting your knowledge ready for reading
The text used to model these teaching and learning strategies is Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes by Eleanor Coerr, published by G.P. Putman Sons.
Predicting and recording content
Students read the Contents page and in small groups predict what might be in each chapter. They record their thinking.
Introducing the prologue
Students are introduced to the terminology and function of a prologue by being asked:
- What does prologue mean? Pro = before, logue =words or story. Students read it.
- What extra things does it tell us about the story? They add these to their reading charts.
Reviewing and consolidating
The students collate what they know about the text and form a mental image of what the story might tell them. They recount their images. They use their beliefs about the list of contents to infer the order of events in the story.
Students also:
- Describe the images they have in their minds from having read the blurb and prologue.
- Suggest the order in which they expect the events mentioned in the blurb to develop in the story, for example, Sadako runs in races, becomes ill, makes the paper cranes.
- Think ahead by suggesting questions the first chapter might answer. These are collated, for example
During Reading: Tuning in to the text
The text used to model these teaching and learning strategies is Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes by Eleanor Coerr, published by G.P. Putman Sons.
Visualising the text
Having read the first paragraph, students visualise Sadako as running, or looking fit like a young runner, moving fast.
Having read the second paragraph they visualise Sadako as running outside her house early one fine, sunny morning.
Having read pages 9-10, they picture what happened after Sadako got up, what did she and the other family members did and talk about their images of her family.
Defining unfamiliar words
Students use the text to work out the meanings of unfamiliar words such as memorial day, respect, altar shelf, ancestors and leukaemia.
Identifying the questions they can now answer
- What tasks does Sadako do in her house?
- Where was she going?
- What was special about Memorial Day and what happened on this day?
Responding to the text
Students talk about their emotional response to the chapter. They are asked:
- How did you feel while reading the story?
- Why did you feel that way? What made you feel that way?
- How would you like to change the text so that it is more interesting?
Exploring key events in the text
Students explore key events in the text through a range of activities. For example, when reading about Sadako's Peace Day, students:
- Imagine what the family and particularly Sadako will do during Peace Day and how she will feel. They link with ‘memorial days’ they have attended, such as Christmas or Anzac Day.
- Reflect on how the writer wanted readers to feel about or to see Sadako.
- List words that might be used to describe some of the activities that might occur during Peace Day, using what was said in Chapter 1 and their experiences.
- Suggest questions they might ask someone about Peace Day.
- Suggest questions Chapter might answer.
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What might Chapter 2 tell us?
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Suggesting synonyms
Students suggest synonyms for some key content words and use the text to work out and visualise the meanings of unfamiliar words. Words in these categories might include ‘pride’, ‘ruined city’, ‘stubbornly’, ‘ugly whitish scars’ ‘prickled’, ‘bomb victim’, ‘relatives’ and ‘lanterns’.
After Reading: Consolidate and review the text
The text used to model these teaching and learning strategies is Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes by Eleanor Coerr, published by G.P. Putman Sons.
Summarising main events
Students summarise the main events that occured in this chapter.
Sadako and her family go to the Peace Day ceremony. She meets her friend on the way.
First they visit the memorial building. Sadako doesn’t feel comfortable here.
They go to the food stalls.
They watch the fireworks.
The family release their candles in lanterns for family members killed by Thunderbolt into the river.
Sadako thinks about the day before she goes to sleep.
Suggesting questions
Students suggest questions the chapter answers, such as:
- What did Sadako do in the street?
- Who did she go to the Peace Day with? How did Sadako feel in the Peace Park and what did she remember?
- What things did Sadako do during the day?
- Why didn't she like seeing the bomb victims?
Teaching Strategies for Non Fiction texts
Before Reading: Getting your knowledge ready for reading
The informative text used to model these teaching and learning strategies is Coral Islands (PDF - 15Kb).
Developing a reading plan
Readers look at the text and suggest how they might read it, the actions (strategies) they might use and where they might pause and review what they know. For example:
- I will read the first paragraph as a ‘topic paragraph’ after I have read the sentences,
- I’ll say what they say another way and then think about what the rest of the text is about.
- As I read each paragraph I will try to make a picture in my mind of what the words say.
- I will stop at the end of each paragraph and say “What do I know now? What has it told me?"
During Reading: Tuning in to the text
The informative text used to model these teaching and learning strategies is Coral Islands (PDF - 15Kb).
Comprending paragraphs
The students read each sentence, work out the meanings of new words, paraphrase, visualise, say the questions answered and summarise the paragraph.
Students:
- Read the topic sentence, paraphrase and predict into the text. This sentence says that the polyps eat tiny animals and plants in the water. The paragraph might tell us what they eat and how they do it
- Read each sentence and talk about each idea; the polyps eat by scooping into their mouths, water that has very small animals. They need energy and to be in warm, clean water to live.
- Note that this paragraph answers the question How do the polyps live?
- Note that this paragraph answers the question How the reef is made?
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Draw a concept map of the sequence.
- Tiny animals, polyps get materials from sea
- They make shells
- Shells join to make branches
- Branches join to make trees