Students embrace and regularly use definitions they create because the definitions come from them and the process of creating such definitions demonstrates their knowledge, thereby building their confidence. Determine important keywords and phrases in a text and present them to students before they begin reading. Tell each reader to write down his own definition to share with the class or instructor. Create a class definition that includes the words and details the students' answers share. Look up the word or phrase in a dictionary and make sure the class definition covers all possible meanings.
Struggling middle school readers avoid reading assignments and do not participate in class because they fear their classmates will call them names. To counteract this fear, teach students reading strategies based on what they already know, thereby highlighting their intelligence and piquing their interest. Before beginning a text, introduce readers to the main theme or idea and discover what they know about it. Give the class a term, "poverty," for example, and write it in the middle of the board. Ask the students what words or images come to mind when they hear the word, writing their answers around the theme and drawing lines between the two. Show how the ideas relate to the theme and reinforce important elements. For instance, society, low income and housing projects are important ideas about the theme "poverty."
Longer texts frustrate middle school students who have trouble reading, and trying to recall or absorb a lot of information at once may frustrate them. Break an assignment into several readings and ask students to take notes every time they read. They should identify important events, writing down what they interpret as the events' causes and effects. From these entries, readers can make a timeline of events much more easily than if they read the entire text and then tried to recall their chronological order. Ask the students to reorder the story's events and see how the plot or theme changes.
Encourage your students to share their viewpoints through an oral presentation or written essay. No position is too unconventional or controversial, as long as the presenter can support her stance with quotes, events and details from the text. This advanced method allows readers to show they understand the issues and found textual support for their position. Prompt students to imagine what an opponent might say or ask about their position as they write and address the topic as thoroughly as possible.