So how do you support a child to read for meaning? Reading is all about decoding the squiggles on the page – then understanding what those squiggles actually mean! And whether it is a story or a non-fiction text, if you don’t understand it, there is not much point in reading it…
Whilst most children slowly develop the skill of reading for meaning, some children find it really challenging. Some will be able to read aloud competently or fluently, but are unable to tell you what they have read or to answer a question about it.
As the child gets older, this can become difficult in other areas of school life. For some it can impact subjects like maths reasoning as well as the humanities and science.
5 tips to support a child to read for meaning at home now
There are various ways that you can support reading for meaning at home.
- Really identify where the child is at with their general level of understanding, outside of actually reading books.
- Pre-teach before reading (discuss the general ideas and any tricky words).
- Encourage the child to spot “clues” in the text which lead to understanding. Become a detective.
- Make reading fun! This is particularly important when you consider how boring it must be to read without understanding.
- Talk about prediction and visualisation in everyday life.
- Take a look at my blog post on reading for meaning for more explanation of these tips with specific examples. You can do nearly all of these “outside of reading time” too!
There are also resources to buy which support reading for meaning. Two very different products that I would recommend are:
This is essentially a speech and language manual. It consists of a series of texts over 4 ability levels. It is not a snazzy, exciting book but it does give solid material to work through. You can use it alongside reading time at home too.
Reading for Meaning workbooks by Gill Nettle is a workbook series where children draw, respond, insert words etc to demonstrate their understanding of relative short pieces of written text.
Listening
In addition, it is worth considering the important role of listening and discussion – story reading (even with older children) and audiobooks for example. This can be a way of allowing a child to focus purely on understanding (rather than also decoding).
Further help
Finally, if you would like further ideas, do consider a one-off tutoring session or a coaching consultation for parents via the Help page.