How Clara learned to read with better comprehension - and so can your child.
Updated: Oct 8
Have you ever watched your child read a passage out loud and thought, “Well, she can read the words…but something just isn’t right?”
Maybe your child can get through a paragraph or school assignment. But the reading doesn’t sound smooth or natural like talking.
Sometimes there are words you do not even recognize - or that they mumble through.
Reading comprehension scores are not good and they do not enjoy reading.
That was the situation Judy found herself in with her daughter, Clara.
Clara was in 7th grade at a small Christian school. She was getting passing grades and could get by in her day-to-day schoolwork. But when it came to annual standardized tests, her reading comprehension scores were not good.
And Judy was worried.
High school was getting closer, and Judy knew the schoolwork would become much harder. She couldn't help wondering, How is Clara going to handle high school if she is already struggling to understand what she reads?
There was another reason this mattered so much.
Clara loved animals. She dreamed about becoming a veterinarian or working in a veterinary office someday. But would she be able to do the schoolwork required to get good enough grades to go to college if she wanted to?
Judy wasn't sure.
She wasn't even completely sure what the problem was.
She just knew that something didn't seem right.
So she decided to have Clara come into my Zoom room twice a week for reading tutoring.
What happened over the next three years was about much more than improving a reading score.
Clara learned how to slow down, read accurately, understand what she was reading, build her vocabulary, and approach unfamiliar words without embarrassment.
Most importantly, she became a much more confident reader.
This is the story of how that happened.
The Problem Wasn't That Clara Couldn't Read
When I first met Clara, I was still fairly new to reading tutoring.
Most of the students I had worked with up to that point were beginning readers. Clara was different.
She was already in 7th grade.
She could already read.
At first I was not sure what to do with a child who could already read as well as Clara but over time this type of student has become my favorite type of student to work with.
It is so fun to watch an older student who has struggled with reading for many years grow in skill and confidence as they begin to realize their own potential.
The first time I met with Clara I asked her to read a grade-level passage aloud to me.
And she read it fast.
Very fast.
So fast that I was caught off guard. I couldn't even keep up well enough to mark her mistakes - if there were any.
When she finished, I asked her what the passage was about.
She didn't really know.
Then I asked her some comprehension questions.
She couldn't answer them.
And here's the funny part: after listening to her read, I wasn't sure what the passage was about either!
I had just experienced something that I would later learn is quite common.
Clara could read most of the words on the page, and if she came to one she did not know she made up a fake word. Just as quickly as if it were a real word and she was just reading it.
This was the first time I had encountered the ability to make up fake words so quickly. I didn’t know what had happened!
When she came to a word she didn't know, she often guessed.
Sometimes she would say an actual word that began with the same letter and sometimes the ending was similar, too. For example “construction” instead of “constriction”.
And sometimes she made up a word that wasn't actually a word at all. Without slowing down she would pronounce an instantly made up fake word and keep on moving.
There were also almost no pauses. At least not in the appropriate places.
She didn't stop at commas.
She didn't pause at periods.
She simply kept going.
It seemed as though Clara had learned that the goal of reading was to get through it quickly.
Don't stumble.
Don't stop.
Don't look like you need help.
Don't embarrass yourself.
Just keep going.
I think this is something many children can develop over time.
When children are regularly timed for fluency while reading, they can sometimes begin to believe that reading fast is the goal.
And honestly, it makes sense.
Who doesn't want to look like a good reader?
But reading quickly doesn't help much if you don't understand what you're reading.
For Clara, we needed to change the goal.
The goal isn’t speed.
The goal is accuracy and comprehension.
First, We Had to Slow Reading Down
One of the first things I explained to Clara was that good readers don't always read quickly.
Sometimes good readers slow down.
Sometimes they sound a word out.
Sometimes they stop and think.
Sometimes they look up a word.
Sometimes they read a sentence more than once.
And that's okay.
In fact, those things are part of being a good reader.
We started practicing this in a very simple way.
When we were reading aloud, I had Clara clap once when she came to a comma and twice when she came to a period.
It sounds simple, but it helped her slow down and pay attention to the punctuation.
And once she slowed down, I could actually hear what was happening.
I could notice when she read a word incorrectly.
For example, when she read “construction” when the word on the page was actually “constriction.”
Or she might come across an unfamiliar word and simply make something up.
Now we could stop.
We could look at the word.
We could sound it out.
We could talk about what it meant.
We could look at the surrounding sentence for clues.
Instead of rushing past the word, we dealt with it.
We talked about how everyone has to slow down sometimes and it’s ok. Nobody knows every word in the English language and sometimes even people with college degrees have to stop and figure out a new word.
We learned that every sentence is made of a subject (who or what is the sentence about) and a predicate ( what did they do or what are they).
Then we worked on phrasing — reading words together in meaningful groups so that the sentence actually made sense.
And whenever we encountered a word Clara didn't know, we worked on vocabulary.
Little by little, reading became less about How fast can I get through this?
And more about:
What does this actually say?
What does this word mean?
What is this sentence telling me?
What is this paragraph about?
That shift made a tremendous difference.
We Also Did More Work on Understanding What She Read
Once Clara was slowing down enough for us to accurately hear and discuss what she was reading, we could work more directly on comprehension.
We read paragraphs together and answered questions about them.
But we weren't simply trying to get the answers right.
We were learning how to think about a paragraph.
We worked on questions such as:
What is the main idea?
What is the subject matter of this paragraph?
What are the supporting details?
What is the conclusion?
What words, phrases, or techniques help make the main idea clearer?
What does a particular vocabulary word mean in the context of the paragraph?
Knowing how to find the main idea and identify supporting details is a skill we all need. We need to be able to think about what we are reading and find meaning.
We practiced. Again and again.
Clara learned to look beyond simply getting to the end of the paragraph.
She learned to ask herself what the author was actually trying to communicate.
And that gave her a much stronger foundation for the more difficult reading she would encounter in high school.
Next We Intentionally Built Her Academic Vocabulary
Another important part of our work was vocabulary.
Next we worked through a curriculum that taught academic vocabulary she would need in high school and beyond.
But we didn't just memorize a list of definitions.
We took each word and used it in several different contexts.
We read several paragraphs that included the word.
We practiced recognizing what they meant when they appeared in different contexts.
We learned words such as saturate, illuminate, emphasize, major, and minor, along with many others.
And something exciting happened.
One day Clara came to my zoom room and announced that she had used one of her new vocabulary words while talking with her mom and one of her mom's friend.
They looked at her and asked, “What does that even mean?”
And Clara knew.
She was beginning to own the words. Not only did she know what they meant but she could also use them in conversation.
Increasing your vocabulary always plays a big role in increasing comprehension.
Those bigger, unfamiliar words that she had previously been guessing and pronouncing incorrectly - making up a different word of her own now had meaning.
And she knew that no matter how many words she knew there would always be more to learn but she could look them up and learn their meaning and grow her vocabulary even more every year.
At the same time she knew that skipping over them, ignoring them, or making up something to say when she didn’t know how to pronounce them would not be helpful at all. She understood now that that would sabotage her comprehension.
We Had Time to Work on Something Bigger, Too
One of the wonderful things about working with Clara for several years was that we had time to read an entire book together.
We read The 7 Habits of Highly EffectiveTeens. By Sean Covey
We took turns reading sections aloud.
Then we talked about what we had read.
Sometimes we stopped to look up a word.
Sometimes we discussed an idea from the book.
And we also took blank notebooks and used them to write notes, make plans, think about goals, and explore our personal ideals.
So Clara was practicing reading aloud and comprehension while also learning about habits that could help her become a effective and successful teenager — and eventually an effective and successful adult.
It was a wonderful combination.
She wasn't just learning how to read better.
She was using reading as a way to learn about herself and think about and plan for her future.
The Results Came Over Time
Clara and I worked together for three years. And over that time, her reading changed dramatically.
She learned to read with much better phrasing and clarity so that the sentences actually made sense.
She learned how to identify the main idea.
She learned how to identify the subject matter and supporting details.
She learned how to recognize conclusions.
She learned how clarifying words and phrases can make an author's meaning easier to understand.
She learned how to use context to help understand unfamiliar vocabulary.
She built a much stronger academic vocabulary.
And she learned that she didn't have to pretend to know everything.
If she didn't know a word, she could stop and figure it out.
If she needed to slow down, she could slow down.
If she needed to look something up, she could look it up.
That's not failure.
That's what good readers do.
Clara Became a More Confident Reader
Perhaps one of the biggest changes was Clara's confidence.
When we started, she seemed to be working very hard to look like she was a good reader.
She rushed. She guessed. She avoided stopping. She didn't want to appear as though she needed help.
Over time, that changed.
She learned that reading isn't a race.
She learned that understanding the material is more important than finishing first.
And she became much more comfortable dealing with words she didn't know.
Her mom noticed the difference, too.
Judy says that Clara is now a better reader than all of her cousins.
That's a pretty amazing change for a child who once could read an entire passage aloud and then have very little idea what it was about.
And the benefits went beyond reading itself.
Clara now has a much stronger foundation for high school and for life.
She knows how to approach challenging reading.
She knows how to slow down when she needs to.
She knows that adults don't know every word, either.
And she knows that she will continue learning new words throughout her entire life.
There's nothing embarrassing about not knowing a word.
The important thing is knowing what to do when you encounter one.
What If Your Child Can Read… But You Aren't Sure They Really Understand?
Maybe you're reading Clara's story and thinking about your own child.
Maybe they are trying to read fast like Clara or maybe they are stumbling on words and getting stuck.
Maybe your child technically knows how to read.
They can get through a passage. They can read out loud.
They may be getting passing grades.
But something is bothering you.
Their reading comprehension scores don't seem to match their ability.
They don't enjoy reading.
They don't choose books for pleasure.
Homework takes forever — or doesn't always get finished.
Their grades are just ok but not as good as you know they could be.
And with high school approaching, you're starting to wonder whether the reading demands are going to become too much.
Maybe you can't put your finger on exactly what the problem is.
You just have a feeling that your child isn't getting everything they should from what they read.
That's worth paying attention to.
Clara didn't need someone to teach her the alphabet again.
She needed help with the other mechanics of good reading — accuracy, phrasing, comprehension, vocabulary, and confidence.
And those skills can make a tremendous difference.
Students in Middle and High School Have Now Become My Favorite Students to Work With.
Clara was one of my first older students and I am very grateful to have been able to work with her. I think I learned just as much as she did.
Before working with Clara all my students started from the beginning - making sure they knew letter names and sounds.
I still always make sure my students have that foundational beginning but for older students, even if they are still working on that, we move on and begin learning more.
Today I have added Structured Word Inquiry (SWI) to the many things that I can do with students to help them move beyond where they have gotten stuck.
Do you have a child that is in middle or high school that seems to be stuck in their reading progression?
Come to my zoom room for a free 20 minute consultation.
During this meeting you can tell me all about your child and whatever is worrying you about their reading. I will ask you some questions and you can ask me questions. We can decide if I can help you. If you decide to move forward we will choose a time that works for both of us.
Would you like to recieve my email where I share helpful tips just like the ones in this blog post?
When you join my email list, you'll receive:
✓ Helpful information about reading development
✓ Answers to common questions about struggling readers
✓ Information about dyslexia and reading difficulties
Comments