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• Reading Comprehension
• Reading in English
• Out of School Time
• Support Materials
• Tote Bag
• About this Site

• Introduction
• Week 1: Initial Assessment
• Initial assessment
• Identifying an assignment
• Making a plan
• Week 4: Non-Fiction Comprehension
• Reading non-fiction
• Using charts, images and graphs
• Non-fiction checklist
• Week 8: Planning and Organizing
• An Unclear Assignment
• KWL Chart
• More practice with non-fiction
• Wrap Up

More practice with non-fiction

Abby: So, what else have you been doing in your social studies class? Do you have any reading assigned for homework?
Marcus: Yes, I have some reading to do in the chapter called "The Geography of New York."
Abby: Let's take a look at it together.

* * *

Abby: This looks interesting. Your book has a lot of graphs, photos, and maps that can help you understand the text. Do you remember our conversation a few weeks ago about reading non-fiction and the things you can do before you start reading? Something called activating your prior knowledge?
Marcus: You mean when we read the science? Yeah.
Abby: Well, this is a perfect place to practice some of those same activities. You see, both the science and social studies books are similar because they are not fiction; they give you information about things that are real and describe the world we live in. Do you see any of those additional supports we talked about before?
Marcus: Well, I see some pictures, and … a chart and another chart…
Abby: Yes, there's a lot of information, some diagrams, some graphs, some drawings and some photographs. There are a lot of different sources of information here, just like in your science book. Can you remember what we did first when reading the science book?
Marcus: We looked at the diagrams and read the headings?
Abby: Good! Why don't you start and we can see how it goes.
Marcus: (Looks hesitant. Doesn't reply.)
Abby: Why don't we alternate reading paragraphs?

Abby and Marcus alternate reading paragraphs in the book and complete two pages, including examining two photographs and a map. Abby is careful to encourage Marcus to read over each of the photo captions and all of the identified parts of the map and to make connections between this visual information and the text to give Marcus additional support.

At the end of their session Abby reminds Marcus to get to work on his report, and to bring in more information for the assignment next time they meet.

An unclear assignment … What just happened?

This session accomplished several things:

• Abby was able to turn what appeared to be an unsuccessful tutoring session into one that addressed some real academic needs
• They planned for an assignment that was not yet fully understood
• Abby modeled how to use photographs and other visual information to support and inform reading non-fiction text, helping Marcus get one step closer to being an independent reader
• The last activity helped Marcus feel more comfortable reading text out loud. This is often a very difficult and embarrassing activity for older readers who are not proficient. Offering to alternate reading out loud is an excellent alternative to having a student read and entire text on his own.

Wrap Up

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Date of Last Updated: 7/14/2004
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