How to improve reading comprehension: strategies that work for kids

Reading comprehension checklist

• Listen to your child read aloud, and read aloud to them, to find the bottleneck.
• Build fluency with short, repeated readings of the same passage.
• Keep reading aloud books above your child's reading level.
• Teach and use interesting new words, including word parts.
• Read several books, especially nonfiction, on one topic to build knowledge.
• Model strategies with think-alouds: predict, question, picture, fix up, summarize.
• Point out how texts are organized and use simple organizers.
• Ask open questions and "What makes you think so?"
• Mix comfortable books with supported stretch texts.
• Ask the teacher about an evaluation if understanding stays well behind.

Try this today

1. Pause and picture. Read a page aloud, then stop and ask your child to describe the picture in their head: Where are the characters? What does it look like? What sounds would you hear? Then compare it with the illustration, if there is one.
2. The one-sentence summary. After a chapter or article, help your child fill in this frame: Somebody wanted something, but a problem happened, so they did something, then it ended this way. For nonfiction, try: This was mostly about…
3. Prove it!. Ask one question about something the text doesn't say directly, like "How do you think she felt?" Your child answers, then has to find and point to a sentence that proves it. Swap roles and let them quiz you.