Reading enables us to travel through time, go places we’ve never been to and understand people without even meeting them in person. Reading should be more than words, it has to be understood. When we understand what we read we have the power to change the world, we can be the successful person we dream of. We can have the ability to make a change. We can be someone that can influence others to do more. That is why reading should have comprehension. We should understand the context of what we have read.

Reading on one’s appropriate reading level is a crucial first step to increasing a person’s reading comprehension. This means that the words should be recognizable and the concepts presented should be age-appropriate. When literature is provided that is too complex, the reader will have to stop to think about what a word means. This leads to them having a disjointed overview of the information and can cause difficulty understanding how the text connects overall. Here are some tips on how to improve your reading comprehension.

• Providing appropriate reading material is the first step to fostering reading comprehension.

• The second step to increasing reading comprehension is encouraging students to respond to what is being read. Reading comprehension centers around the student taking an active approach to the reading material. Materials to increase their analysis of the text should be encouraged. This could mean providing worksheets to fill out, having the students summarize the text, or pulling out general themes within the literature. Student engagement is crucial to increasing reading comprehension.

• The third step to fostering reading comprehension is by leading discussions on what is read. When a student discusses what is read with another person, they can understand the other student’s point of view on the text. Verbal processing helps a person remember what they read by talking through the main points, themes, and plot. The conversation should happen before, during, and after the reading to increase comprehension.

There are also three types of reading comprehension questions. The three types of questions include:

• literal
• inferential
• evaluative

Literal questions are those where the information is found directly in the literary text.

 Inferential questions are those that are more difficult to answer than literal questions. Their answers are less obviously stated in the text. Inferential questions are deduced from the information found in the text that is being analyzed. 

Evaluative questions are those that require the reader to formulate an opinion on the text. Reading comprehension involves answering all three types of questions.

By: Marvin S. Santiago|Teacher II |BNHS TLE Department|Balanga City, Bataan