Noteblog ELL

I feel that book club is a great way to teach comprehension. Book club allows students to read a book by themselves then discuss it in their group or "book club." Students may also get chances to write about different parts of the story that stood out to them in their reading log, like we are doing with our book club. If a student is confused about a part in the story, he or she can ask someone in the group to clear up the confusion. Also, by discussing the story, each student will be able to hear each other student's point of view and thoughts on the story. A student may gain a new idea or look at the story in a way that he or she did not think about before. Through this way of thinking about the book, students are learning to look at the meaning of the words on the page. In other words, they are learning to comprehend the book.

The Tompkins chapter gives other strategies for teaching comprehension. These include focusing on the structure of the text, the genre of the text, and the content and vocabulary of the text. When a text a structures and organized in a way that makes sense and allows for all ideas to be present, then students will have an easier time comprehending what the words are trying to say. Also, by giving the students different genres to look at, they will have the chance to view different types of structures in writing and will be able to read different texts that convey different meanings. For instance, they will learn that a fantasy is make believe while non fiction is informational. Knowing this, will help them better comprehend text. The final point, content and vocabulary, is based on the students' prior background knowledge. If a student is familiar with the content and the vocabulary in the text, they will have a better idea of what the words mean and will be able to put the text together and build an overall meaning from it.

I really liked the examples in the Gibbons chapter that allowed the reader to see what it would be like to read if you didn't understand the context of what you were reading. For example, the procedure paragraph on page 80. I was able to read the words, but was not sure of what they were saying. This is how it would be for an ELL student. I also likes the ideas that the chapter gives for teaching ELL students and all students comprehension. I will remember some of these steps when I teach my lesson at placement. There are no ELL students in my class, but there are struggling readers who may benefit from some of the strategies.