Assessment of Reading Comprehension (Cognitive Strategies)

Grace Oakley

What are Reading Comprehension Cognitive Strategies?

• Visualising• Making connections• Fix-up strategies• Summarising• Asking questions• Making predictions• Inferring

VisualisingMAKING

CONNECTIONSSummarising

Asking Questions

Fix up strategies

INFERRING

Framework for teaching CSI• Based on a review of the research, Duke and Pearson

(2002, p. 208) suggested a framework for comprehension strategy instruction, based on Bruner’s (1990) notion of ‘scaffolding’ or ‘gradual release of responsibility’(GRR).

• An explicit description of the strategy and how and when it should be used

• Modelling of the strategy in action – Think alouds

• Collaborative or guided use of the strategy– E.g. Reciprocal Teaching, Read-Along Guides

• Independent use of the strategy

Children need to know

• What the strategy is (declarative knowledge)• How to use it (procedural knowledge)• When and why to use it (conditional

knowledge)• How to evaluate whether ‘it worked’• ( ... so teachers need to assess children’s

understanding of what, how, when, why ...)• See Almasi (2004)

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Focus for today• Questioning– Questioning the author– Flip it (turning sentences into questions)– E.g. Making up inferential, evaluative questions

• Visualising (creating mental imagery)– Picturing settings, characters– Picturing action, processes

• Mind pictures• Story Wheel• Sketch to Stretch (see Read-Write-Think)

http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/lesson-plans/guided-comprehension-visualizing-using-229.html?tab=4

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• ‘Understanding what readers are thinking during reading remains a complex task’ (Israel, Bauserman & Block, 2005, p. 21).

• What are they thinking before, during and after reading??

• Assessment of processes difficult. Can be inferred to some extent from products.

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Assessment challenges

Assessing children’s use of the strategies

• Collect assessment data through– Artefacts– Talk– Observation

• Evaluation – what does the data mean?

Think Alouds

• Think Alouds– Children are taught to think aloud as they read –

this can allow teacher to ‘see’ what they are thinking. Can also improve metacognition.

– ‘Stop and Think Cards’ or stickers can be places in pre-selected places in text.

– Technology can be used to facilitate this.

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Using rubrics to guide assessment

• Ellin Keane has developed some rubrics to assist teachers in assessing comprehension thinking strategies.

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http://www.shelleducation.com/newsEvents/lori_ira2009_handout.pdf

Assessing through the Arts

• Drama • Drawing– Including drawing during read aloud

• Video examples from: Into the Book• http://reading.ecb.org/teacher/visualizing/ind

ex.html

Interviews– Reflective Metacognitive Interviews – get children to

describe how they did the work or read the text and why they did it that way. Bloom’s taxonomy can help teachers create probing questions.

– Published interviews e.g. Metacognitive Strategy Interview (Schmidt, 1990). 25 multiple choice questions such as: • Before I begin reading , it’s a good idea to:• A) See how many pages are in the story• B) Look up all the big words in the dictionary• C) Make some guesses about what I think will happen in

the story• D)Think about what has happened so far in the story

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ReferencesAlmasi, J. F. (2004). Teaching strategic processes in reading. NY: The Guilford Press.

Athans, S. K. & Devine, D. A. (2008). Quality comprehension: A strategic model of reading instruction using read-along guides, grades 3-6. Newark, DE: IRA

Israel, S. E., Bauserman, K. I., & Block, C. C. (2005). Metacognitive assessment strategies. Thinking Classroom, 6(2), 21-28.

Keene, E. (2006). Assessing comprehension thinking strategies. Huntington Beach, California: Shell.

Mokhtari, K., & Reichard, C. A. (2002). Assessing students' metacognitive awareness of reading strategies. Journal of Educational Psychology, 94(249-259).

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Oakley, G. (2011). The assessment of reading comprehension cognitive strategies: Practices and perceptions of Western Australian teachers. Australian Journal of Language & Literacy, 34(3), 279-293.

Oczkus, L.(2009) Interactive think-aloud lessons: 25 surefire ways to engage students and improve comprehension. NY: Scholastic.

Schmidt, M. C. (1990). A questionnaire to measure children's awareness of strategic reading processes. The Reading Teacher, 43(454-461).

Some websiteshttp://www.decd.sa.gov.au/northernadelaide/pages/comp/37986/?reFlag=1

http://www.curriculumsupport.education.nsw.gov.au/literacy/assets/pdf/packages/combook.pdf