Chapter 1
Phonological and Phonemic Awareness and Emergent Literacy
Course: Elementary Education Multiple Subjects 7001
Subject: Elementary Education Teaching Reading Subtest 7002
Chapter: Comprehension Of Literary And Informational Text
1. Overview
Comprehension instruction must be deliberate, structured, and inclusive of all learners, including English language learners, students with learning differences, and advanced readers. Systematic and explicit instruction ensures that students develop the cognitive strategies and habits needed to understand a wide range of texts. It involves teaching comprehension processes directly, modeling their application, guiding students in practice, and gradually releasing responsibility until students can apply strategies independently.
Effective comprehension instruction acknowledges that understanding text is not a passive process but an active and strategic one. Skilled readers constantly make predictions, monitor for understanding, ask questions, visualize, summarize, and connect new information to prior knowledge. Struggling readers, however, may not automatically engage in these strategies. Therefore, educators must teach these processes explicitly.