11 Plus Exams Forum

Hi,

First of all, many thanks and a big well done to all of you here. Much appreciated.

I am new here and may be a bit greedy asking for answers straight away, sorry.
My daughter is sitting this exam coming September. She has a problem with comprehension, esp. non fiction.

She reads a lot however I have got a feeling that she is not understanding fully what she is reading. I understand that looking for meanings while reading an interesting story is not desirable (that's what she told me ), and don't expect her to master the English vocabulary, but would like to help her try to figure out the meaning of words she has never heard of, from the context of the sentence.

Any ideas on how to achieve this please.

Many Thanks

My advice would be for her, would firstly be to try and figure out the word class of the word (verb, adjective etc.). Then she should try fitting in some words that she does know and eventually she will figure out the meaning of the word or something close enough that will get her the mark. To be honest, this does take practise. As her exam is in September, I would try to encourage her to practise this skill often so she will get the hang of it. I have found this very useful in my previous exams.

One thing which seems really obvious, but surprised me, was that it is really helpful to read with them - I had pretty much stopped doing that as soon as my daughter was happy reading independently, but someone on this forum suggested starting to read with her again at least a few times a week - taking it in turns me reading to her and then letting her read to me; and it really helped. I would stop just once or twice every few pages to ask her if she knew what a word or phrase meant, or to discuss something the writer had done cleverly. She was a bit at first, but ended up enjoying it - and was definitely making better / more thought through guesses at difficult words.

Thank you so much for your replies.. @Eliza7 will try that, but with an attention seeking 3 year old running around, it seems a bit hard, however, got to do it if we need improvement.. Had a parents evening and teacher suggested the same.. she said to do it at least three times a week.. I had stopped it once she has become a free reader too.. @TY Toys We are doing this, but she is struggling to find similar words.. eventually, after giving some clues, we give in and tell her what could be substituted there. Will keep up the effort.. Thank you