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January 25th, 2012
How to Improve Reading Comprehension With Technology
When students learn to read, books don’t have to be the only medium they use. Today, a variety of technological options exist for improving reading comprehension, from websites aimed at reading to teacher-created resources using the computer. Use the technology you have in your school to help improve your students’ reading comprehension skills, and you will find a new way to reach struggling readers.
Difficulty: Moderate
Instructions
Things You’ll Need
Computers with Internet access
CD player
MP3 books
Suggest Edits
1)Create a webquest to activate prior knowledge about a book before reading. When you want to teach a book that will require extra information for your students to understand it, it can be helpful to give them background information before they read. As an example, if you want to teach Harper Lee’s novel, “To Kill a Mockingbird,” it might be helpful for students to understand the historical background of the novel before they read it (the Depression, 1930s race relations in the Southern United States, the Scottsboro Boys trial). Set up an Internet scavenger hunt (also known as a webquest), where your students will visit sites about these historical facts and answer questions about them. You can find a variety of webquests already online through sites like eduscapes.com if you don’t want to make your own.
2)Allow your students to practice using websites that are created for reading comprehension skills. For elementary students, sites like scholastic.com or starfall.com have reading games that students can play, and even quizzes they can take about the information they have read. Older students might use websites set up by the state department of education for standardized test preparation on reading (for example, in the state of Florida they have Odyssey and FCAT Explorer sites to help students practice for state assessments). Some students feel more comfortable navigating web pages than the pages of a book; for these students, they can improve their skills online and then apply those skills in other reading formats.
3)Provide chances for students to listen to a book as they read by using a book on CD. You can play it for your whole class and have them read along, or let individual students use this method with headphones. Some students are auditory learners, and they improve their reading skills when they can hear an experienced reader as they read on their own.
4)Ask your school media specialist about mp3 books. These types of books resemble a regular mp3 player, but they only have one thing on them: a read-aloud version of a book. Students can listen to these books on headphones and read along with a printed version to improve their reading comprehension skills. Plus, as an added bonus, the format of these mp3 books is attractive to tech-savvy students.
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