The Think2Read Comprehension Thinking skills programme yielded encouraging results at the Project’s host school in 2006. SATS results for Year 6 children who participated in the Think2Read programme research at Dartington Primary School, Devon showed a particularly high comprehension result of 90% passes at level 4/5, with a significant rise in standards in just two terms.
The school considered this to be especially encouraging because of the number of children with dyslexic tendencies that were included in the score.
Teachers reported that pupils were more willing to learn from one another’s assumptions and keen to explore and challenge each other about text and the author’s intention within the reciprocal reading process. Dr. Maureen Lewis, an observer from the NLS who came to visit the school in 2005, reported that the sessions appeared to have ‘opened the gates to children’s learning of prediction, clarification, questioning and summarising.’ Children were found to be experiencing a much greater appreciation of the books they were reading and were better prepared to engage in more independent and meaningful exploration of author’s intention, style of writing, narrative and non-fiction text and different genre.
In addition this has introduced them to the world of ‘the author’, where for many they were beginning to understand for the first time how authors write with intention using inference clue devices to build imagery and plot. This effective and fun approach to the development of writing had such an impact on many of the children, that they moved a whole level up in their writing as a result of this discovery - in just one lesson. This experience also led them to transfer their deductive thinking practice to a variety of contexts across the curriculum; once they realised that they were able to use inference devices to help them to solve a range of problems, particularly with regard to maths and science.
The programme’s success resulted in publication of the step-by-step methods used to teach these strategies ‘Quick fix for Year Six – Comprehension’ (Thomson & Nixey, 2007), followed by the series 'Scholastic Literacy Skills - Comprehension (New Edition)' Years 1 - 6 (Thomson & Graham, 2009).
Apart from giving in-depth explanation and lesson plans that support the explicit teaching of comprehension thinking skills, the ‘Quick Fix’ resource is also designed to support children and teachers in their preparation for Year 6 SATs comprehension tasks. It also follows the recommended comprehension strategies in the renewed Primary Framework for literacy.
‘Quick Fix’ offers teachers the following SATs support-
- A structured revision course for your class to help achieve top marks in SATs
- ‘Don’t panic!’ boxes provide teachers with consolidation opportunities and extra support suggestions
- Practice papers – with answers provided
- Covers the comprehension strategies in the renewed framework: prediction,questioning, clarifying, imagining and summarization
- Explains literal, inferential and evaluative questioning techniques, as well as the Reciprocal Reading Process
For further support, see Courses/Workshops page.
