Reading Strategy Cards

• Supporting Pre-Emergent Readers and Emergent Readers *
• Reading Engagement: Focus, Stamina, and Building a reading life *
• Supporting Print Work: Accuracy and integrating sources of info *
• Fluency: Phrasing, Intonation, and Automaticity *
• Comprehension in Fiction: Plot and Setting *
• Comprehension in Fiction: Characters *
• Comprehension in Fiction: Themes and Ideas *

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Click the * after a topic to go to the beginning slide of each goal

• Comprehension in Nonfiction: Main Topic and Ideas *
• Comprehension in Nonfiction: Key Details *
• Comprehension in Nonfiction: Text Features *
• Vocabulary and Figurative Language *
• Speaking, Listening, and Deepening Comprehension *
• Writing about Reading *

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Strategy Title

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Teaching Tips: Teaching text goes here. Short simple sentences that give kids what to do and why they should do it.

Choose Engagement

Teaching Tips: Sometimes, we just have to will ourselves to be interested in a book. We have to set our mind to it and decide we’re going to enjoy the book even before we start reading. We can be mentally strong when approaching books and increase our engagement

Be Mentally Strong and Choose to be Engaged

I am going to read it like it’s the most interesting thing ever!

I’m going to MAKE my mind stay on the book!

I’m going to use my mind to picture what’s happening in the book

• Before reading, GET YOUR MIND READY!

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• Start by reading OUT LOUD like it’s the MOST INTERESTING thing ever!

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• Now, keep doing that, but reading in your mind

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• Make a movie of the book in your head!

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Take a “Break” from One Genre

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Teaching Tips: Good readers try to vary the types of books they read. It’s nice to have favorite books and favorite genres, but it’s also important to build the muscles in your brain for other kinds of books. This will help you improve your focus and make you a better reader overall.

“Break” Reads

Pre-plant sticky notes with short term goals in a book of a genre you don’t usually read

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2.

When you hit a sticky note, stop and take a “break”: with your favorite genre book

• What books have you chosen from a genre you don’t usually read for your longer reads?

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• What books have you chosen as “break” books?�
• How much do you plan to read before you need a break?

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• Set a sticky at that goal

Strategy Title

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Teaching Tips: Teaching text goes here. Short simple sentences that give kids what to do and why they should do it.

Juggle All 3 Balls

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Teaching Tips: Good readers are always checking themselves for understanding. When they come across a word they don’t know, it’s important that they try to sound it out, but if that doesn’t work then what? Well, they don’t just rely on one strategy! They think about 3 different things at once! What word would make sense here? What word sounds right here? What word looks right here?

Juggle All 3 Balls

Make sense?

Sound right?

Look right?

When you get to a word you don’t know:

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• Does it look right?
• Does it sound right?
• Does it make sense in the story?
• Think about what’s happening in the story.
• What letters does the word have in it?
• What could it possibly be?

Get Your Eyes Ahead!

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Teaching Tips: Good readers try to read text smoothly at a good pace. In order to do this, they must read the words quicker in their mind than they can with their mouth out loud. Good readers push their eyes ahead toward the end of the sentence even though they are two or three words behind out loud.

Get Your Eyes Ahead!

The cute white cat is soft and fluffy.

• Look ahead of where you’re reading

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• Let your eyes push ahead and preview what’s coming up

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• Try reading a sentence in one breath

Teaching Tips: Good readers can identify the main problem in a book. One way to do this is think about all of the different story elements (characters, setting, theme, etc.) and ask if they are connected to the problem or even causing the problem.

What’s Your Problem?

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What’s Your Problem?

What does your main character want? Why can’t he have it?

Where does the story take place and is that making the problem worse?

Is there a theme of the book? Is the author trying to teach a lesson?

Name any other character. How are they connected to the problem?

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Could there be more than one problem?

Conflict Reveals our Character’s Character

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Teaching Tips: When characters face obstacles, how they react tells us a lot about our character. Sometimes, they will respond differently depending on the conflict. Just like you, they have many different characteristics. Sometimes they might be brave and other times they might be shy or scared. Good readers understand how characters react to situations and can even start predicting how a character might respond.

• Find a point in the story when there is conflict.

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• How does your character respond?

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• What was the character like before this conflict?

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• How has the conflict changed the character?

Conflict Reveals our Character’s Character

How is your character going to respond?

Craft Theories About Characters

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Teaching Tips: Characters do all sorts of things in books, and when you start putting together all the things they do, you can come up with a THEORY about a character. A theory is something you believe is true and you can support it with evidence even if the author doesn’t come out and say your exact theory. Good readers support their theories with strong evidence from the text. These theories help you understand characters better.

• Notice some actions your character does
• Notice how your character responds to conflict or obstacles
• What are some things your character says?
• Think about all these things and come up with a THEORY about your character

Craft Theories About Characters

What do you know about your character that the author didn’t outright say?

What does your character do or say?

How does your character act?

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Dig Deeper to Find Theme

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Teaching Tips: Good readers often look for deeper meanings in their books than just the story. One way to do this is think about “What is this book really about?” Try to name the problem of the book in just one word or phrase. Usually a theme is something that can relate to other books or even life

Theme

What is the story REALLY about?

What is your book about in ONE WORD?

Dig Deeper to find

• Think about the problem your character is facing.

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• How can that problem be said in one word or phrase?

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• Does this book have a problem similar to problems in other books? What is the link?

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• What is the last thing you’re left thinking about?

Reactions Lead to Lessons

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Teaching Tips: Good readers look at the interactions between two characters. Often, how a character responds to another character can lead us to a lesson. If we stop and think about the character’s reaction or why they reacted the way they did, we might be able to learn a life lesson.

Character #1 Action

Reactions Lead to Life lessons

• Think about 2 characters in your book

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• Now think of an important interaction between the two of them

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• Think specifically about how one of the characters responds or reacts to the other character

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• Is there a lesson you can learn from that response?

Character #2 Response

LESSON!

Brian repeatedly asks others to try eating fruit

They finally try it.

When trying new things, you might as well GO FOR IT!

Symbols Repeat

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Teaching Tips: Often, authors will use objects to represent much larger ideas or themes. Good readers pay attention to these objects that repeat and ask themselves questions like, “What idea could this object represent?” or “What topic is the author trying to talk about?” Then, they try to answer these questions to get a deeper understanding of the book.

Symbols Repeat

• Pay attention to things that the author repeats in the book

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• Things that repeat could be objects, settings, words/phrases, or characters

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• Ask yourself “What bigger idea could this object represent?”

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• What could that object mean?

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Characters

Objects

Settings

Words or phrases

Look for the ideas behind things that repeat

Strategy Title

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Teaching Tips: Teaching text goes here. Short simple sentences that give kids what to do and why they should do it.

Read Between the Lines

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Teaching Tips: When reading nonfiction, good readers pay attention not only to the main text, but to the other elements the author has included on each page. Readers can look at all these other elements (pictures, titles, captions, graphs, etc.) to figure out what the MAIN IDEA of the text is. Before reading, look at the other elements on the page and see if you can identify the main idea before even reading the text. Then, after reading, compare your first thought to what the text said.

Title

Fast Fact

Title should give you the topic

Pictures, graphs, and pop-out facts could give you a hint at the main idea

• Before reading the main text, survey the other elements on the page (title, pictures, graphs, etc.)

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• Then, make an inference about what this page will be about

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• Read the main text

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• Compare what you read with what you thought the page might be about

What? And So What?

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Teaching Tips: When reading nonfiction, good readers know the topic they’re reading about. However, they also know the main idea about that topic. The topic can usually be inferred just by looking at the book, but the main idea takes a little bit of thinking and processing on the reader’s part. Good readers ask themselves, “So what?” in order to figure out the author’s main idea. The answer to that question is what makes the book important or worth reading.

What?

Topic: Fog and Clouds

So what?

Main Idea: The author claims that fog can be important because some of the water droplets can be collected and used by humans.

• Think about the topic of your nonfiction book

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• What do you think the author is trying to say about this topic?�
• Why is this topic important to the author?

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• Does the author have an angle or a slant?

Strategy Title

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Teaching Tips: Teaching text goes here. Short simple sentences that give kids what to do and why they should do it.

Read, Cover, Retell

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Teaching Tips: Good readers pause every now and then to check that they are understanding the text. One way to do this is to read a section of text that is about as big as your palm. Then, cover that section with your hand and try to retell the main idea of the section in your own words.

Read, Cover, Retell

• Read a section of text about as big as your hand

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• Pause and cover that section with your hand

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• Try to retell the main idea of that section in your own words

This part is about...

For Sure, Think, Wonder!

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Teaching Tips: Sometimes we let what we think we know stop us from really understanding what an author is trying to teach us. To avoid this, before reading about a topic, jot down or think about what you already know for sure about that topic, what you think you know about that topic, and what you wonder about that topic.

Jot what you...

Know for sure

Think you know

Wonder

• Before reading a book, take time to think about or even jot down what you know for sure.

• Then think about what you THINK you know about the topic...you can think, “I’m not sure, but I think…”

• Then think about what you WONDER about a topic.

• After you read about the topic, compare what you learned with what you thought you knew!

Ready, Set, Caption!

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Teaching Tips: A lot of informational texts include pictures as text features. Sometimes these pictures come with captions explaining the picture and connecting it to the main idea. However, not all pictures have captions...yet! Good readers read the text and try to link it to what they see in the picture. Try writing your own caption explaining the picture and how it connects to the main idea!

No Caption? No Problem! Write your own!

• Scan the page and look at the text features
• If the picture does not have a caption, look closely at the picture.
• Then read the text and try to connect what the text says with what you see in the picture
• Then, write your own caption on either a sticky note, a stop-and-jot journal, or just in your head!

Mountains are tall!

Prove It!

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Teaching Tips: Good readers not only state the main idea of informational text, but they can support the main idea with details. Most importantly, these details come FROM THE TEXT! Yes, it’s good to have background knowledge and use it, but it is also important to understand how the author supports the main idea.

Make a fist and State the main idea

Hold up your fingers as you list details that support the main idea

• Read a section of the text

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• Think about what might be the main idea the author’s trying to convey

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• Look back through the text and find details that support that main idea

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Teaching Tips: Teaching text goes here. Short simple sentences that give kids what to do and why they should do it.

Building Word POWER!

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Teaching Tips: Good readers stop when they come across a word they don’t know the meaning of. Then, they use clues on the page such as text, titles, and pictures to help them guess what the word means. Then they ask if their guess fits in with the book they’re reading.

• Stop when you hit a word you don’t know!

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• Check the picture if there is one.

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• Reread the sentence that comes before it.

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• Read a few sentences after it just trying to figure out the meaning of the word

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• Substitute a word you know for the tricky word and see if it FITS!

Building Word POWER!

Tricky word: Deciduous

Use pictures

Use the title

Trees in Fall

These beautiful trees are called deciduous.

That means they lose their leaves

Read the sentence before

Read the sentence after

Strategy Title

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Teaching Tips: Teaching text goes here. Short simple sentences that give kids what to do and why they should do it.

Strategy Title

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Teaching Tips: Teaching text goes here. Short simple sentences that give kids what to do and why they should do it.