During their independent reading, have students record, or grab, exciting verbs, adjectives or other types of literary elements, as instructed. Then, have them gather in small groups to display and discuss their findings. This activity helps to broaden vocabulary as well as assist with visualization and analyzing word choice. It also makes readers more aware of the words and types of speech for improved comprehension. Alter the assignment for identifying difficult or unknown words as well.
Practice using context clues by using highlighters to improve reading comprehension. Choose a text passage for students to highlight synonyms, antonyms, appositives and inferences with different colored markers for each type of word. This activity can also be used as a group project. Each assembly is assigned one type of context clue that's shared with the whole class. After color coding, the children discuss findings and provide predictions about what will happen next in the text, identifying the style and tendencies of the author.
Many young people don't understand how to effectively use a textbook or types of informational text. A book walk, or teacher-led breakdown of the text, helps them get more from reading by emphasizing scanning an entire section before managing the individual paragraphs of a book. A graphic organizer is drawn on the chalkboard to instruct students on identifying parts like headings, bold words, graphics charts, pictures and captions. After these elements have been pointed out and discussed, pupils make predictions about what the actual paragraphs will contain.
Identify text elements such as emotion, tone, or other literary device by using markers on a whiteboard -- then define what students will record. Popular choices can be an emoticon for likes or dislikes, question marks for a question, or an important keyword. Then, begin reading a passage aloud. At various points during the reading, stop and ask for explanations behind each mark. After each restart, students must clear the board and record a new reaction..