Quick "how to" question......Comprehension!!

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loveyouradvice
Posts: 160
Joined: Mon Nov 28, 2011 1:24 pm

Quick "how to" question......Comprehension!!

Post by loveyouradvice »

Hi

What's the best way to approach a comprehension? Especially given tight time limits.....

One:
Read it swiftly once, underlining key things and then plunge straight into answering

Two:
Above but read all questions before starting to answer them

Three:
Skim read it and the questions, then read a second time marking key bits for questions Then answer.

Im inclined towards the last though think it might be a bit slow - DD tends towards One but often misreads question or text...... What are your thoughts?????
3HMum
Posts: 14
Joined: Wed Oct 19, 2011 10:42 pm
Location: Croydon

Re: Quick "how to" question......Comprehension!!

Post by 3HMum »

Actually I am really pleased that you asked the question ; I was about to ask almost the same thing as I am not too sure to be very good with Comprehension myself and I am the one teaching my DD. Would definitely not like to misguide her. all suggestions will be so welcomed.

Thanks :D
Okanagan
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Joined: Mon Aug 22, 2011 9:20 pm
Location: Warwickshire

Re: Quick "how to" question......Comprehension!!

Post by Okanagan »

I tend towards a fourth method - just to confuse you even more! Read the first question. Then read the text knowing what you are looking for until you get to the point where you cna find the answer. Then repeat for each subsequent question starting from where you finished previously. As most comprehensions tend to have the questions in the same order that the information appears in the text this usually saves having to do much re-reading.
bondgirl
Posts: 802
Joined: Wed Sep 21, 2011 11:30 am

Re: Quick "how to" question......Comprehension!!

Post by bondgirl »

And just to confuse things even more, DS was taught by his tutor to read the whole text through TWICE before starting to answer the questions.

I guess you're going to have to give a few different methods a try and see which one works best for your DC :D
loveyouradvice
Posts: 160
Joined: Mon Nov 28, 2011 1:24 pm

Re: Quick "how to" question......Comprehension!!

Post by loveyouradvice »

Great answers... we'll experiment .... and more answers hugely welcome! Love to know from people who have experiemented what seemed to work for their child best given tight time limits!
bravado
Posts: 468
Joined: Thu Jun 07, 2012 11:28 am

Re: Quick "how to" question......Comprehension!!

Post by bravado »

loveyouradvice wrote:Hi

What's the best way to approach a comprehension? Especially given tight time limits.....

One:
Read it swiftly once, underlining key things and then plunge straight into answering

Two:
Above but read all questions before starting to answer them

Three:
Skim read it and the questions, then read a second time marking key bits for questions Then answer.

Im inclined towards the last though think it might be a bit slow - DD tends towards One but often misreads question or text...... What are your thoughts?????
loveyouradvice - I'm not sure which area you're in so I'll mention that my comments refer to our experience of tutoring DIY tutoring DD for the CSSE (Essex) test :D
One:
Read it swiftly once, underlining key things and then plunge straight into answering


She'd have found it difficult to decide which were the key areas to highlight, without having read the questions. So we/she didn't do this.

Two:
Above but read all questions before starting to answer them


Again, she'd find it hard to know what to highlight before having seen the questions.


Three:
Skim read it and the questions, then read a second time marking key bits for questions Then answer.

This might indeed be a bit slow.


These are the strategies we experimented with:

One:
Read the text swiftly but don't skim. Start the questions, highlighting the lines each question refers to ie lines 20 - 23 - that way the eye is drawn quickly to the place on the page. We took care to ensure that DD read a bit before and a bit after the specific lines, to ensure that context was understood and that she didn't miss something pivotal.

Two:
Quickly read all the questions first, so that when she carefully read the text, she had more of an understanding of which bits may be relevant and where to find them - even making quick keyword notes in the margins, which refer back to keywords in the questions. Start the questions, again quickly highlighting the areas/lines for each question.


We found that our number two worked best for DD and I think Okanagan's would also have worked....but I was too chicken to gamble on doing this, in case the questions on the big day, weren't set out sequentially, in terms of the text-flow lol! :oops: :D

My biggest piece of advice, is to ensure that your DC actually "reads" the text efficiently and effectively, rather than going far too fast. It's a fine line isn't it? The time pressures can sometimes cause our DC's to rush the reading of the text too fast, thus hampering their chances of answering the question properly, or sufficiently. However, if they take too much time, they can possibly jeopardise their chances of having time to enter their mark or write their answers :roll:

We got DD to write down the start and finish time of reading the text because we'd had a suspicion that she wasn't giving enough time to it and skimming far too fast. We remedied this by getting her to continue writing down the start and finish times, which helped her to check that she'd given it a good 5 - 7 minutes. It helped with her marks :D

The beauty of this site, is that there's so many thoughts and ideas from parents - you can mix and match, try them out and tailor them to your DC's needs :D
loveyouradvice
Posts: 160
Joined: Mon Nov 28, 2011 1:24 pm

Re: Quick "how to" question......Comprehension!!

Post by loveyouradvice »

Bravado - what a great answer - so thoughtful and love reading about your experiments.

Going to try them... and particularly like the idea of timing start and finish time on reading as I know DD skips stuff. Also concerned that her current underlining key things is a bit random and distracts her from actually absorbing the text!

Would be great to hear of anyone else's experiments and ideas - look forward to sharing your experiences!
rowena
Posts: 8
Joined: Sat Nov 03, 2012 7:48 pm

Re: Quick "how to" question......Comprehension!!

Post by rowena »

What a fine question!

May I suggest something different? Please tell me if I am wrong.

1 Glance through the questions first.
2. read the text and highlight the text with the questions in mind. This would allow the text to be read with at least some questions in mind and to highlight the relevant portions.
3. Go back to the questions and answer them.
yoyo123
Posts: 8099
Joined: Mon Jun 18, 2007 3:32 pm
Location: East Kent

Re: Quick "how to" question......Comprehension!!

Post by yoyo123 »

I am amazed how many pupils read the extract and then don't refer back..as if it is a memory test!
um
Posts: 2378
Joined: Sat May 30, 2009 1:06 pm
Location: Birmingham

Re: Quick "how to" question......Comprehension!!

Post by um »

Good question :D .

However this very much depends on which examination exactly you are taking.

For the extremely time limited multiple choice CEM exams, the best bet is just to read the text then answer the questions one by one, referring back when necessary.

For a SATS paper you could certainly get away with reading all the questions first if you wanted - and reading the text twice, etc. This would also be the case for some Indie exams.

I think it is important not to be dogmatic or tell children that there is a particular way to do this, as much will depend on the child/their reading speed/general comprehension ability etc.

I find it is more useful to help children to fully understand the type of question they are dealing with, what is expected from their answer, and become confident and practised in finding the answer within the text, and knowing, when initially reading the text, what types and forms of information to be looking out for.
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