Reflecting on Your Own Comprehension Strategies

Effective readers often use strategies for comprehension automatically. To others, our comprehension might seem like magic as the often complex work of comprehension is essentially invisible to less effective readers. Making the invisible effort of comprehension visible is essential so that our learners can see how we recognize that we hit a comprehension roadblock and apply a strategy to break through it. In this way, less effective readers can see that becoming a skilled reader is like learning any other skill: it takes practice!

Read the following paragraph for understanding with the following guiding question in mind: In what ways are ichthyosaurs similar to modern toothed whales?

Soft-tissue evidence for homeothermy and crypsis in a Jurassic ichthyosaur

Ichthyosaurs are extinct marine reptiles that display a notable external similarity to modern toothed whales. Here we show that this resemblance is more than skin deep. We apply a multidisciplinary experimental approach to characterize the cellular and molecular composition of integumental tissues in an exceptionally preserved specimen of the Early Jurassic ichthyosaur Stenopterygius. Our analyses recovered still-flexible remnants of the original scaleless skin, which comprises morphologically distinct epidermal and dermal layers. These are underlain by insulating blubber that would have augmented streamlining, buoyancy, and homeothermy. Additionally, we identify endogenous proteinaceous and lipid constituents, together with keratinocytes and branched melanophores that contain eumelanin pigment. Distributional variation of melanophores across the body suggests countershading, possibly enhanced by physiological adjustments of color to enable photoprotection, concealment, and/or thermoregulation. Convergence of ichthyosaurs with extant marine amniotes thus extends to the ultrastructural and molecular levels, reflecting the omnipresent constraints of their shared adaptation to pelagic life.

What strategies did you use to gain meaning as you were reading?
What strategies did you use when you got to a point in a sentence or a part of the paragraph that was confusing or did not make sense?

Watch the following short video for examples of possible strategies an effective reader might use to understand the passage above.

Fix Up Strategies.PNG

Struggling readers need to learn explicitly about fix-up strategies and have opportunities to apply them and reflect on which ones work best, why, and when. Once students know the basics of decoding print, we need to support them in developing strategies and practices that help them build their comprehension and repair it when needed.

Click "Next" to read about how the Think Aloud strategy can help to make the invisible, visible to our learners!