What is reading? The simple answer is that reading is decoding words on the page to create meaning for the reader. The ultimate goal of reading is comprehension - understanding what the writer is trying to tell you, combining that information with what you already know, and learning new information. Building a strong foundation for reading comprehension is important for academic and life success. 

In this blog post, we'll explain what reading comprehension is and why it is important. We will also share practical ideas for helping your child build a strong foundation for reading comprehension.

What is Reading Comprehension?

Comprehension has two main categories: listening and reading. When your child understands what you say and follows simple directions, they are using listening comprehension. Once they learn to read, they will be using reading comprehension to understand written words, sentences, and longer passages. 

Listening comprehension begins early in your child’s life. When your baby responds to you with coos and body gestures, they are practicing listening comprehension. Toddlers learn to speak by listening and interacting with others. 

Reading comprehension is more challenging because it requires your child to learn the alphabetic code. They need to know how to connect letter shapes and letter sounds, so they can map words into their mental dictionaries. Orthographic mapping allows your child to instantaneously recognize words. This reduces the load on their brains, making room for them to give more attention to the meaning of what they are reading.  

Reading comprehension requires the reader to combine what they already know with what they are reading. It sets the stage for success in school and helps children understand and connect with the world around them. It’s a complex process, but there are many useful strategies readers can learn to increase comprehension. 

Why is Reading Comprehension Important?

Reading comprehension is important because it helps your child gather information, learn about the world, and understand a wide variety of writing. Once your child learns to read, everything that has been written in their language, past and present, is available to them. They can learn new ideas and concepts all on their own, without having to rely on someone to read to them. 

Your child will be able to read directions for games, construction projects, hobbies, and more. They can learn about animals, inventions, and places around the world and outer space. School will also be easier when they have a solid foundation for reading comprehension.

How to Help Your Child Build a Foundation for Reading Comprehension 

A child is never too young to begin building a foundation for reading comprehension. Rich life experiences and exposure to books are two ways to help your child develop the background knowledge they need for reading comprehension. Building phonemic awareness, grapheme-phoneme (letter-sound) knowledge, and a large vocabulary will help your child become a strong reader. When your child can quickly decode words, it frees the brain to focus on the meaning of what is being read. 

Here are some practical tips to help build a strong reading comprehension foundation.

1. Build Broad Vocabulary:

Talk with your child about everyday events and experiences. Research shows that helping your child build a large oral vocabulary is a strong predictor of reading comprehension. 

A large vocabulary makes it easier for your child to decode unfamiliar words encountered while reading. After a few “sounding out” attempts, they will often connect their approximate pronunciations to a word they already know. This is especially helpful because the English language has complex spellings and multiple sounds (phonemes) for letters and letter combinations (graphemes).

2. Enrich Shared Reading

Read with your child every day. Shared reading exposes them to thousands of words that are not commonly used in everyday conversations. Talk about unusual words and how words can have different meanings when combined with other words.

For example, close and clothes sound similar but have multiple meanings and pronunciations. You can close a door, stand close to someone, and fold the clothes. You can have a close relative or feel like the air is close on a humid day.

Another example is read, read, and red. You can read a red book or you may have just read a red book. You can also say the crayon is red and that person is well read. 

Make sure some of the books you read together are about topics your child is not familiar with. This will help build background knowledge and expose them to richer vocabulary. Understanding what words mean in different situations, makes it easier to gain meaning from groups of written words. Reading and discussing stories, poems, and non-fiction books with more complex themes and ideas improves listening comprehension and thinking skills.  

Read books with beautiful illustrations that spark conversations about the story and ideas that go beyond the story. Your child might also enjoy looking at the pictures before you read a story or making up their own story to go with the pictures. These activities require imagination and deeper thinking which support comprehension. 

When you are reading a chapter book and the chapter ends on a cliffhanger, have your child make predictions about what will happen next. Making this a regular habit might make it easier for you to end a reading session on a positive note when your child is begging for just one more chapter. It also helps them use what has happened in the book to guess what might happen next. This requires more complex thinking and interaction with the story.  

3.  Listen and Learn

Listening comprehension is a predictor of reading comprehension. Play a Follow the Direction game by giving your child simple directions to follow. Begin with one simple direction such as “Put the red ball in the bowl.” Gradually increase the number of directions you give at once. For example, you might tell them to take off their shoes and put them on the shoe rack.

When you read books together, ask your child questions about the story and characters. Make connections to personal experiences and talk about memories of family events. Ask what they enjoyed, what they wish, what might happen next, or how they would change a story ending. 

Encourage your child to share their ideas and opinions. Little kids have big ideas and listening to their stories and explanations helps them build confidence in speaking. Sharing ideas through conversations also helps them organize their thoughts which is helpful for learning to express themselves in writing.    

Summary

Reading involves decoding words so the reader can understand what the writer is telling them. Comprehension is the reason we read. Reading comprehension helps the reader know what the author is saying, combine new thoughts and ideas with what they already know, and learn new information. With a strong foundation for reading comprehension, children have greater success in school and in life. 

In this blog post, we explained what reading comprehension is and why it is important. We also shared practical tips for helping your child build a strong foundation for reading comprehension. 

In summary, to help your child build a strong reading comprehension foundation:

1. Encourage listening comprehension through conversations and playful activities
2. Build background knowledge and vocabulary with books and life experiences
3. Practice letter-sound correspondences so reading words becomes easy and automatic 

Five minutes a day using the Alphabites game pack will help your child quickly learn letter sounds, shapes, and names. The pack includes 26 active games that use simple items you already have at home. It also includes 400+ child friendly words and 32 unique tongue twisters for practicing Phonemic Awareness. You'll also get access to our FREE digital Quick Start guide. We recommend bite sized learning, just 5 minutes a day, to set your child on the path to reading success. 

Sources

Catts, H. W., Herrera, S., Nielsen, D. C., & Bridges, M. S. (2015). Early prediction of reading comprehension within the simple view framework. Reading and Writing, 28, 1407-1425. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Hugh-Catts/publication/281930976_Early_prediction_of_reading_comprehension_within_the_simple_view_framework/links/56003c7808aec948c4fa694f/Early-prediction-of-reading-comprehension-within-the-simple-view-framework.pdf 

Duke, N. K., & Cartwright, K. B. (2021). The science of reading progresses: Communicating advances beyond the simple view of reading. Reading Research Quarterly, 56, S25-S44. https://ila.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdfdirect/10.1002/rrq.411?fbclid=IwAR3iwBG4k1Sbh1R_o2ZraKb1bR-Sr4XtntRzsmnOvDAvY9k4gKi_B8o5wck 

Hjetland, H. N., Brinchmann, E. I., Scherer, R., & Melby‐Lervåg, M. (2017). Preschool predictors of later reading comprehension ability: A systematic review. Campbell Systematic Reviews, 13(1), 1-155. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdfdirect/10.4073/csr.2017.14 

Language and Reading Research Consortium, & Chiu, Y. D. (2018). The simple view of reading across development: Prediction of grade 3 reading comprehension from prekindergarten skills. Remedial and Special Education, 39(5), 289-303. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1191953.pdf