You can teach your child how to pass a reading comprehension test by teaching simple test strategies.
The most important strategy is to teach your child how to mark up a reading comprehension test. To clarify, marking up a test is similar to making notes in a margin, or next to a story passage.
Most importantly, your child should read a story 3 times. For instance, children should read a passage 2 times for accuracy and a third time for deeper understanding. However, the third read is for marking up the text. For example, on the third read have your child make notes using these reflections; a personal connection, a question, a drawing or a prediction . Additionally, an older child can also use inferencing (guessing) .
In brief, this reading strategy is called active reading. As a rule, an active reader shows what they are thinking as they read. In short, thoughts should appear alongside a passage or story . Most importantly, your child should use all of the reflections or some of them, but no less than three.
An Example of Marking Up The Text
Sue has a dog. I have a dog ( personal connection)
The dog is fat.
The fat dog sat.
It sat on a bow. The dog might be tired (inference)
It sat on a toe.
It sat on some snow. The dog might sit on a hat (prediction)
It sat and sat and sat What is the dog’s name? (question)
In the example above, the reader shows what they are thinking as they are reading. Consequently, this improves reading comprehension. Therefore, the reader should able to understand enough about the story to answer the questions accurately.
Answering The Questions
Subsequently, teach your child to read a reading comprehension test question more than once. First, your child should underline or highlight key words or words that are important. ( I have bolded these words in parenthesis instead).
For example, “Sue has” are the important words in this question
1.(Sue has) a dog
___ hog
_X_ dog
____ham
After that, the reader should look back in the story and find the words “Sue has”. Next, highlight or underline those words. Meanwhile, continue to read the sentence, Sue has a dog.
(Sue has) a dog
The dog is fat.
The fat dog sat.
It sat on a bow. Q#1
It sat on a toe.
It sat on some snow
It sat and sat and sat
As a result, your child has found the answer to question #1 . Next, have your child write Q#1 next to the text ( see above). In this case, this will show where your child finds the answer. Moreover, this will be helpful to you as you guide your child’s progress. So, the answer to question # 1 is found .
Your Child’s Reading Comprehension Test Should Look Like This
(Sue has) a dog. I have a dog
The dog is fat. Q#1
The fat dog sat.
It sat on a bow. The dog might be tired
It sat on a toe.
It sat on some snow. The dog might sit on a hat
It sat and sat and sat What is the dog’s name?
- (Sue has) a _______
___ hog
_X dog
____ham
In conclusion, once your child gets the hang of these active reading strategies, teach them to follow the same steps for every reading passage and each question. As a result, It may take a little longer to complete a reading comprehension test. Certainly, it might look messy and it should. However, an A on a reading test is the goal. Most of all, you can adapt these strategies for any grade.
To sum up, Happy test taking !!
ADDITIONAL READINGS:
TEACH READING – COMPREHENSION LESSON #1 PROBLEM & SOLUTION
TEACH READING – COMPREHENSION LESSON #2 PREDICTIONS
TEACH READING – COMPREHENSION LESSON #3 THE CHARACTERS
TEACH READING – COMPREHENSION LESSON # 4 THE SETTING
TEACH READING – COMPREHENSION LESSON #5 PHONICS PRE K- 2
QUICK GUIDE – SUGGESTED SCHEDULE FOR TEACHING AT HOME