LESSON 14 COMPREHENSION

Overview:
In this lesson, we will look at the role of reading comprehension in promoting
peace and understanding during the learning process. We will talk about how reading
comprehension can help students develop empathy, understand diverse points of view,
and peacefully resolve conflict. We will also look at ways for developing peaceful
comprehension questions that encourage learners to be conscious and understand.
Peace Concept: Peaceful Learning Questions

Learning Outcomes:
At the end of the lesson, the students can;
1. define reading comprehension;
2. identify strategies to improve reading comprehension; and
3. create questions for each domain of Bloom’s Taxonomy, using the idea of
peace as a guide..

Materials Needed:
• E-copy/Printed Lesson Module
• Power Point Presentation
• Smartphone/Computer/Laptop

Duration: 3 Hours

Learning Content
Comprehension means understanding, or extracting meaning from what you read, and
is the ultimate goal of reading. Indeed, reading comprehension is viewed as the
“essence of reading” (Durkin, 1993), essential to both academic learning and to lifelong
learning. Comprehension has three major areas of concern. (1) Vocabulary
Instruction: reading comprehension is a cognitive (thinking) process that incorporates
complex skills and requires vocabulary learning and development. Vocabulary learning
strategies practiced in lesson 9 contribute considerably to how well a pupil understands
what is read.
(2) Critical Thinking Skills: questioning skills used to gain a deeper understanding
of the information in the text, as well as how that knowledge can be applied to the
world.
(3) Text Comprehension Strategies: active reading behaviors pupils use to make
necessary connections to prior knowledge and understand the information in the text.
Experienced readers may not appreciate the complex skills required for
understanding text. The process of comprehension is both interactive and strategic.
Rather than passively reading text, readers must analyse text, internalize it, and make
it their own. In order to read with comprehension, developing readers must be able to
read with some level of fluency, and then receive explicit instruction in reading
comprehension strategies (Tierney, 1982).
Reading comprehension requires “intentional thinking during which meaning is
constructed through interactions between text and reader” (Durkin, 1993). Meaning is
in the intentional, problem-solving, thinking processes of the reader that happen while
reading a text in a purposeful and active way. A text’s meaning is influenced by the
reader’s prior knowledge and experience. There are many purposes for reading. A
pupil can read a text to learn, to find out information, or to be entertained. These
various purposes require the reader to use her knowledge of the world.

Vocabulary Instruction
Pupils begin schooling with different levels of language skills and word knowledge.
Some pupils might use many words, and other pupils may use very few words. It is
important for teachers to provide pupils with many opportunities to increase their
language and vocabulary skills. Pupils need deep levels of word knowledge and
worldly experience to understand many texts.
Hart and Risley (1995), researchers in in the United States of America, found that high
quality interactions between a pupil and his/her family can help the pupil increase
vocabulary knowledge and support literacy skills (reading and writing). Teachers may
be able to suggest activities to the parents which can help the pupil learn. There are
many ways that families and communities can help pupils learn about the world around
them, build their word knowledge, and help pupils understand the structure of books.
One way to build a pupil’s language skills is to ask parents to talk to their children.
Although this sounds simple, it may not be part of the culture of the village, town, or
home. When parents have conversations with their children about what they are doing
(chores, going to church/mosque), sing songs together, and tell stories about the
village and the family, children benefit. Talking to children and telling them stories not
only help them build deep word understanding, but also helps them understand the
language of narrative texts.

Pupil Language Skills and the Family (findings from Hart &Risley, 1995):
• 86% to 98% of a child’s words at age three were copied from their parents’
vocabularies.
• The words used by parents and children were nearly identical.
• The average number of words used and the length of conversations for
children were similar to those of their parents/caregivers.
• Children’s speech patterns were similar to those
of their parents/caregivers.
• The number of words a child heard varied greatly along socio-economic
lines.
• Children from the poorest class of families received half of the language
experience given to children from working class families.
• Children from the poorest class of families received less than one-third of
the language experience given to children from wealthy families.
• Wealthier families provided their children with far more words of praise
compared to children from the poorest families.
• Children from poorer families received far more negative reinforcement
compared to their peers from wealthy families.
The Goal of Reading
Reading comprehension is understanding what is being read. Without comprehension,
reading is simply looking at symbols on a page with your eyes and making sounds the
symbols represent. Reading comprehension is important because without
comprehension, the act of reading does not provide the reader with any information.
When a pupil reads for comprehension, he engages in several complex cognitive
processes. The pupil is using his phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary,
and reading strategies to construct meaning from the text.

Reading comprehension is an intentional, active, interactive process

that occurs before, during and after a pupil reads a text.

In order to comprehend, the reader must be able to make connections between letters
and the sounds they represent, blend those sounds into words (or recognize the words
by sight), fluently read words, phrases, and sentences, and understand the vocabulary
used in the text. If the individual words do not make sense to the reader, then the
overall text will not make sense. Pupils can draw on their prior knowledge of
vocabulary, but they also need to continually learn new words. The best vocabulary
instruction happens when the pupil needs to understand the word in context. Teachers
should pre-teach new words that a pupil will encounter in a text and aid the pupils in
understanding unfamiliar words as they come up in the text. In addition to being able to
understand each individual word in a text, the pupil also has to be able to put them
together in phrases and sentences to develop an overall conception of what the author
is trying to say. Reading comprehension is incredibly complex; therefore, readers do
not develop the ability to comprehend texts quickly, easily or without explicit instruction.

Bloom’s Taxonomy and Comprehension Brainstorming:

Work in groups to answer. Out of the following, which is more difficult…and why?
1. Watching a video, or, making a video?
2. Repeating a story, or, writing a story?
3. Describing an event, or, comparing two events?
4. Explaining a concept, or, evaluating a concept?

Critical thinking skills are ways of thinking about topics or content in new and
insightful ways. Entrepreneurs, researchers, engineers, doctors, and inventors must all
think critically about the problem they are working to solve. Much like reading
comprehension, critical thinking skills develop over time and with explicit instruction.

Bloom’s Taxonomy of the Cognitive Domain

 Knowledge can be divided into several cognitive domains. The Bloom taxonomy
classifies the behaviours associated with what learners can do with new information,
from the simplest to the most complex, describing what is expected from pupils at the
conclusion of a lesson series (Slavin, 2009, p.413).
Bloom’s taxonomy has six carefully defined categories that apply to all subject matter
(Krathwohl, 2002). These categories are often seen in a pyramid arrangement,
assuming that the pupil must have acquired the skills of the lower domain in order to
be able to function at a higher domain. Skills on the higher levels of the pyramid
become more complex, difficult, abstract, and require critical thinking. Complicated
tasks related to utilizing and evaluating information fall into the upper cognitive
categories. Often at the higher levels, learners produce a tangible product that
represents their learning, or they could provide argument for or against the information
presented. In all cases, higher level learning goes beyond simple recall. Summaries
below are drawn from Anderson and Krathwohl, 2001:
Remember—The pupil is able to recall, restate, and remember learned information;
this is the lowest level of the cognitive domain. This is simple recall of what has been
learned, and is often the who, what, when, and where tasks we assign.

Understand—The pupil grasps the meaning of information by interpreting and

translating what has been learned. The pupil can put the information in his/ her own
words.
Apply—The pupil makes use of information in a new situation, different from the one in
which it was learned.
Analyze—The pupil breaks learned information into its parts in order to understand
and identify evidence for a conclusion.

Evaluate—The pupil makes decisions based on in-depth reflection, criticism, and

assessment.

Create—The pupil creates new ideas and information based on what has already been
learned.

Relevance to Reading Comprehension

Bloom’s Taxonomy is a commonly-used tool for writing lesson objectives and learning
standards. It provides a variety of outcomes pupils are expected to display after
learning has occurred. Teachers, parents, volunteers; anyone who reads aloud to an
audience, or who assesses a reader’s comprehension, can utilize Bloom’s Taxonomy
to discuss the learning that has occurred. Assessing true reading comprehension skills
must reach across the levels of the cognitive domain. Sight words are an excellent
example of why. What learners do with the information they see in print and with what
they hear varies greatly. If a pupil can point to a card and say the word he sees
(because he has memorized it by sight), he can remember. This does not mean he can
define the word, use the word in a sentence, or know what the word means in a story.
These are all critical reading skills that must be assessed to ensure the pupil can reach
his fullest potential.

Pre-Reading, While-Reading, and Post-Reading Questions

Asking questions before reading can provide insight to the teacher about how a pupil
will process new information. A teacher can assess background knowledge and assist
pupils in making early connections between what they have already learned and new
information. Further, the right pre-reading questions can also incite interest in a story
or text, gathering the attention of the learner and focusing it where it needs to be.
Asking questions while reading allows the teacher and pupil to monitor
comprehension, explore information in the text, and address misunderstandings.
Asking questions after reading provides opportunities for pupils to demonstrate
understanding and respond to the text.
lower order thinking skills
higher order thinking skills
rememb understand apply analyze evaluate create
e
r
 recogniz interpretin executin differentiatin checkin generating
i ng g g g g (hypothesizin
(identifyi (clarifying, (carrying (carrying out) (coordina g)
n paraphrasing out) (discriminatin ti ng. planning
g) , implemen g, detectin (designing)
recalling representing, t ing distinguishing, g, producing
(retrievin translating) {using) focusing. monitorin (construct)
g exemplifyin selecting) g
) g organizing ,
(illustrating, (finding testing)
instantiating) coherence, critiquin
classifying illustrating, g
(categorizing, outlining, judging)
subsuming) parsing,
summarizin structuring)
g attributing
(abstracting, (deconstructi
generalizing) n
inferring g)
(concluding,
extrapolating,
interpolating,
predicting)
comparing
( contrasting,
mapping,
matching)
explaining
(constructing
models)
(retrieved from: http://www.psy.gla.ac.uk/~steve/best/bloom.html)
Putting Bloom’s Taxonomy to Work
Reading Comprehension moves beyond just remembering information to actually
applying that knowledge to something else. This idea is the whole essence of the
bloom classification in comprehension. Levels of learning can be displayed by what
pupils do with their new knowledge. These are the actions we want pupils to recognize
and strive for when processing information. It is not enough to be able to remember
information, pupils need to use that information. Teachers (and parents) can help a
pupil reach a higher cognitive level with the right types of questions.

Bloom’s Question Samples:

Taxonomy
Domain
Creating Can you make a new plan for .........?
What can you do to ........?
What would happen if ...............?
Consider how .........?
That is not possible, is it? Do you see a solution for ......?
How will it continue?
Evaluating What do you think of this? Do you agree with .......and
why? Why do you think this is a good solution? What
can you do differently next time? Do you believe
that .........? Is there a better solution possible for ...........?
How would you feel if ...........? What would be the result if
........? Do you know a better solution?
Do you think it is right or wrong that ........and why?
 Analyzing Can you explain why ….....? How is it possible that ...?
What was the problem? Why did it happen?
Would this have happened even if .............?
What problems do you see? What could happen?
If ......is true, what are the consequences for .........?
What is the difference between ......and ...........?
Applying What do you want to change?
How would you solve this problem? What questions do
you ask? What should ........ have done if …..... was not
there?
Can you make a drawing differing in one aspect to the
story?
Understanding How do you explain that ....? What happened if .......?
Just remember...... Tell in your own words what
..........?
What kind of ....... is this? What might have happened,
really?
Remembering What happened next? How often ..........? Who was.......?
What do you need to.......? Is this necessary for .......?
Where did he/ she meet .........? When did ……. happen?

Learning Activity:
Instruction:
1. Divide the class into small groups, and give each group a different Bloom's
Taxonomy category (knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis,
synthesis, and evaluation).
2. Ask each group to come up with three comprehension questions about a
reading passage or topic they chose, making sure the questions fit into the area
they were given.
 3. Encourage the groups to ask questions that show they care about peace and
each other. For example, they can ask questions that make readers think about
how the characters feel or suggest ways to fix problems without violence.
4. After the groups have come up with their questions, have them trade with
another group.
5. Then, each group will try to answer the questions they were given, which will
help them develop critical thinking and understanding as they think about the
peaceful parts of the questions.
6. Facilitate a discussion with the whole class in which each group shares their
original questions, the questions they got, and their thoughts on how peace
ideas can be used in comprehension questions.

Learning Evaluation
Discuss the following questions:
1. Why is it important for teachers to use leveled questions?
2. What is the benefit of low-level questions?
3. How can a teacher move the pupils further up the pyramid?
4. What is the benefit of higher-level questions?

References
Anderson, L. W., Krathwohl, D. R., Airasian, P. W., Cruikshank, K. A., Mayer, R.
E.,Pintrich, P. R., Raths, J., & Wittrock, M. C. (2001). A taxonomy for learning,
teaching, and assessing: A revision of Bloom’s taxonomy of educational
objectives, abridged edition. White Plains, NY: Longman.

Duke, N. (2004). The case for Informational text. Educational Leadership.

http://www.ascd.org/publications/educationalleadership/mar04/vol61/num0
6/TheCaseforInformationalText.aspx

http://www.psy.gla.ac.uk/~steve/best/bloom.html