Providing Ongoing Support

Abstract

When adults talk about reading history, most of us think of a range of history- related texts: historical fiction, periodicals, biographies, diaries, documents, reports, and documentaries. Yet, when I talk with students about reading history, they immediately talk about reading history textbooks. This leads me to believe that our task as teachers is twofold: expanding the range of reading that students define as reading history and increasing students’ ability to comprehend that range of texts—including their textbooks. Much of the comprehension support we provide during reading is focused on helping students negotiate a range of texts. For many students, obstacles to comprehension occur when they are presented with a diverse range of text types. Several aspects are involved in supporting students’ comprehension in reading history, because comprehension is always a complex issue. Nagy highlights the complexity of comprehension with this statement in Teaching Vocabulary to Improve Reading Comprehension: “Reading comprehension depends on a wealth of encyclopedic knowledge and not merely on definitional knowledge of the words in the text” (1988, 7). While lists of vocabulary words are often introduced to students prior to assigning reading, it is clear that comprehending reading assignments is about more than defining words. In order for students to comprehend the diverse types of texts they encounter in reading history, they must know how to use and when to employ a wide range of independent reading strategies. Those challenges to comprehension include, but are not limited to, the following text-related reading issues:… • Diverse levels of readability are represented in a single text. • Texts present multiple concepts in a short amount of space (concept density). • Knowledge on how to use text supports to support reading is lacking. • Ability to break the language code (specialized vocabulary) is required. • Comprehension is predicated on significant background knowledge. • Sophisticated study/memory techniques have to be employed to organize and retain information. • Monitoring techniques have to be employed so important concepts aren’t missed. • Knowledge of what supplemental resources (atlas, map, almanac) can provide is necessary. • Knowledge of how to read supplemental resources is required. • Texts may not hold or capture reader’s interest so readers must be selfmotivated. • Multiple texts must be held in memory for comparison, contrast, and discovery of patterns.