5. Activating Your Student's Prior Knowledge

As you begin your lessons with your student, you will need to guide her in setting a purpose for reading, activating her prior knowledge, and selecting appropriate reading strategies. To illustrate this point, please read the following passage:

What does this passage describe?

What would you need to understand this passage better?

Would it have helped you to know the title?

Now reread the passage. Does it make more sense? Why?

Setting a purpose for reading

Good readers set a purpose for reading. Poor readers will often begin to read a passage right away without pausing and examining the title of a book or article, skimming through the pages to view illustrations, or reading the synopsis inside a book jacket or a summary at the top of an article. Often they'll just jump right in.

If you notice your student doing this, you will need to slow her down. By discussing the topic ahead of time, she can draw on a variety of life experiences. Help her to understand the text by:

• pointing out a title or illustration, 
• encouraging her to flip through a book or magazine article, or skim through a website,
• asking what she already knows about the topic, and 
• asking her to predict what the passage is about.

This process might go slowly at first. You will have to model the procedure and describe what you are doing.   Follow this procedure consistently, so that the habit becomes ingrained in your student.

In this way you will help her to set a purpose for reading. She will also begin to understand that she already knows a lot about the topic before she begins to read.


Helping your student with active reading

K-W-L Activity (Click here for a K-W-L sheet)

A good reader is someone who thinks before, during, and after their reading experience.

This activity (click on the live link above) will help your student activate her prior knowledge before reading, sustain continued involvement while reading, and reflect back on the reading after she is done. If your student is unable to write, do the writing in the chart for her.

At first you might want to use this activity systematically. KWL helps you to understand how much your student already knows, and provides her with the chance to use her life's experiences to understand the text. The activity also helps both you and your student check up on her comprehension as she goes through the text and reflect on what she has learned after the lesson.

K stands for What I Know
W stands for What I Want to Know
L stands for What I Learned

Using KWL

• Ask your student to read the title of a passage and look at the pictures and predict what the text will be about. (Magazine articles provide plenty of images!) Ask her fill out the first column, What I Know (K). 

• After some discussion, ask her to fill in the second column, What I Want to Know (W). You can fill it in for her if she is unable to write. In a small group, ask the most experienced writer to fill in the KWL chart. (It is important to choose a text that is of high interest to your student, or you might hear her saying "I don't want to know anything else about this topic." If she collects stamps, you might want to choose an article about stamps from an exotic country, or if he loves to watch basketball, you might choose an article about the Boston Celtics.)

• Then ask her to read the text. 

• Your discussion afterward will help her to identify What I Learned (L).

Tip: Practice this activity with someone in your family or a friend before trying it with your student.