When reading is kept fun, kids learn more!  Reading Comprehension strategies should not be about worksheets or workbooks or quizzes.  They should be able to understanding what has been read!  Bringing books and stories to life is the best way to help kids comprehend what they are reading!  This video gives two ways to do just that!

Audio version: www.DecodingLearningDifferences.com

Transcript:

This is Decoding Learning Differences with Kimberlynn Lavelle and this episode is don't forget! Reading is fun! So we'll be talking about reading is fun. Tomorrow. If you're watching this live tomorrow is March 2nd read across America day. So I wanted to take a little time today to talk about reading and keeping in mind that reading is fun. All learning should be fun and reading is kind of part of that fun learning process.

So keep In mind that reading is fun. What are you doing for read across America day? What are you reading? What are you enjoying? Tell me about, Got it. Okay. Reading fun. There is a guide if you don't have it yet. There's a reading comprehension guide that I created called the octopus has guides reading comprehension. It is www.YourParentHelp.com/readingcomprehension,

 all smushed together as one word. So look for the link below for that. If you don't have it yet, it has eight powerful ways that you can get your child's reading comprehension boosted, making it fun, enjoyable. It's got zero worksheets, zero workbooks, because those are good at like assessing reading comprehension, even practicing answering those questions.

And it doesn't really build the actual comprehension part. The really understanding what you're reading part. So check that out.  YourParenthelp.com/readingcomprehension. The first strategy from that guide that I wanted to talk about today is it's not the first strategy in there, but it's one of the ones that I do the most with my son. So I was trying to think like,

okay, little kids, what are the ones that they might do the most? The one that my toddler loves and adores is act it out. I mean, he doesn't know that he's doing a reading comprehension strategy. He just knows that he's enjoying reading. And so we read something and then he's acting it out all day long, all over the place. And I don't know if he would have started doing that naturally anyway,

but we kind of fostered that from the beginning that after he read something, we were playing that game. We were talking about it. We were acting it out with little characters. So it can be when you're acting something out, it counts. If you have other animals that are kind of acting it out, you're modeling it, like playing with it that way.

Or you can be in character and you're living it, your, this character. So like, well, there's just so many things he loves to do. One of them is let's pretend to be a firefighter from one of his stories. Who's chopping down the playroom door to save Huckle. And so he says all the words, and as he's saying that his whole body is moving and engaged and acting it out.

And when you're acting out what you've read, you definitely understand what you just read because you can't do it. If you don't know what to do. Right. So that's a really fun one, especially with the younger kids who tend to be a little bit more willing to get silly and fun and act things out. You can definitely have some dress up clothes that would support it.

You can also have like little characters. A lot of times the older kids still like acting things out, but they do it more in like small ways with like little characters. And it doesn't have to be like an exact replica of what was in the story. But you can like even have just like a little block and call it. Well, this was the firefighter.

And like, you can start playing With that. And if you start acting it out and you start Being silly with it, then a lot of times your kid will want to be silly back and we'll join in the fun and be like, that's not what happened. It was this. And, or they'll just, they'll go along with it. Or you'll see them doing the exact same thing later,

maybe with the same book, maybe with a different book. So act it out as one strategy that I would highly encourage you to try. Especially if you have the younger kids and then the older kids, this is a fun one that I've come up with a few years ago. I had some students who they totally understood with their reading and they love to talk about it.

But when it came to doing a book report, it was like pulling teeth. They hated it. They also did horrible on tests like the reading comprehension tests that were being given. And so, but we knew that they understood it. So it was like, we wanted them to be able to do something else, to show that they understood it, that they would enjoy.

So we said they could be YouTubes like they could pretend, or actually it was up to the parents, decide, to have a YouTube channel, some kind of video that they are creating about what they just read. So it can be like telling all the highlights that, Oh, I just read this book about this. And it's got these Great characters and you'll just love the hook at the end.

Not going to spoil it for you. Right? Like you can kind of show them what might be included in a video review, or you might find some on the internet that they could watch and see how they might want to model their own within that. They might even choose to get into a character or act something out so you can give them ideas.

You don't have to, like, none of this is stuff that should be forced. It's all designed to be like, Hey, would you want to do this? Would you be interested in doing this? And if they say no, don't push it. Don't be like, Oh, but this is going to be fun. Let it go. Wasn't going to work.

And they might get interested later. A lot of them what's. So with this strategy, most of the other strategies, you can kind of start doing them yourself and see if they'll join you in that fund. A lot of times that works better than making them feel like they have to do something. So YouTube is all about setting up some kind of video review.

And maybe it's a video that you just take on your phone real fast and then send it to grandma and grandpa. And they feel like they've made a video and they sent it out and they probably will love to rewatch their own video, which actually will help them remember what they just read and comprehend it even better. And you might even have them analyze,

you know, the next level up right. Is you might want to have them analyze their video. What would you include next time? What do you think you could do differently that might make it a little more interesting or a little better? Or did you include all of the most important things that you think readers really should have? And it doesn't have to be like,

and so if your child is currently in school, a public school or private school, or any kind of like formal schooling, or if they recently been pulled out, they might be hesitant to be analyzed or to do analysis in that way, if there was resistance in school, because they might feel like you're saying it's not good enough, or you're saying it needs to be better.

They might feel like there's some kind of grade attached to it. And if they say, yeah, they could have done better than they're getting an F or they're getting a C or whatever. Like they might feel a little anxious about it and just say, well, you know, you can even just make it light and just let them know. Like,

I'm always looking for ways to improve everything I do. Right. We're never the best ever possible. We always have room for growth. So I'm just wondering, like what, what you're noticing that you could improve on next time. What could be better next time? So it's definitely true for me. I have a lot of room for growth. I know that I'm going to be embarrassed in a few years when I listen to these podcasts or watch these videos.

Oh man. But I'm always improving and that is life. Okay. So then, you can get the guide with all eight of the strategies. I just talked about two of them today. You can get the guide with all eight of the strategies at www.yourparenthelp.com/readingcomprehension. And let me know how it goes, what you're thinking, what you're feeling. Again, this has been Decoding Learning Differences with Kimberlynn Lavelle and I will talk to you next week.