Inference and visualization are just two of the six strategies good readers use. The others are making connections, questions, determining importance and synthesis. All of these need to be explicitly taught to all students through teacher modeling , guided practice and independent practice. They do not require a seperate program but they do need a teacher who will model the strategies. Students need time to develop good comprehension skills. If you want to know more read these tow books, “Mosaic of Thought” by Ellin Keene and Susan Zimmerman and “Strategies That Work” by Stephanie Harvey. They explain how and what to do to teach comprehension.
Re: Reading comprehension
Absolutely not. I was just trying to say that it is possible to do this without using a program. I also wanted to stress that there are other comprehension strategies that need to be taught as well as visualization. some children are not good at visualizing but that doesn’t mean that they won’t comprehend the story. I wanted to let people know of some amazing books about reading comprehension. These two books have changed forever the way I teach reading. I seemed to be searching for something to help teach comprehension and I found it. There are many ways to the same end and this is just one of them.
Nan
Nan, I’m hoping your post here isn’t meant to imply that a program like V/V DOESN’T also model and practice the other strategies you’ve listed. They ARE explicitly taught through this program.
I agree that the average student ought to be taught these strategies and doesn’t need a specific program for doing so. I’ve always hated it that kids are expected to take reading comp. tests as soon as they’ve learned how to decode. About a third of the students will have no trouble with this, and at least another third will benefit from practicing strategies. Then there’s the minority who really do need so much help that they benefit from a well-organized program designed for that purpose alone. V/V suits that final group of students.
I’ve used elements from V/V with my regular student population without having run systematically through the program. It’s great for practicing all the strategies you mentioned as well as improving visualization skills. But a good teacher will know how to do this without following anyone’s program to the letter. I’m hoping that’s what you’re addressing in your post.