Comprehension Connections: Bridges to Strategic Reading

I didn't quite realize the little nugget I had purchased until I was about 35,ooo feet in the air! I bought this book at the recommendation of a teacher on my grade level near the end of the school year. I skimmed it and decided it could wait until summer vacation. I guess the black and white photos didn't entice me enough to read immediately. It was tucked into my carry on bag and I pulled it out after the flight attendants made their way up and down the aisle with drinks and pretzels. Instead of quickly reading for tidbits, it was clear that I needed to take careful notes, ask questions, and create a list of activities to engage my students into thinking about their thinking. The author creates a framework in which teaching strategies isn't complicated, abstract or boring. Before the students get into the text and begins inferring, visualizing or identifying their schema, Ms. McGregor has given lesson ideas, lesson dialogue and lesson visuals that are fun, mysterious, personal, interactive,and engaging. I also love that her lessons do not need an expensive setup to complete. Any prop or materials she suggests in teaching strategies is something easily obtained for low or no cost. I read half of the book during a California to Texas flight. It was simple to read but full of insight, ideas, and resources that I had not considered using when teaching comprehension strategies. I wish she had mentioned a few more picture books she has used with particular success for each strategy. Now that I have this big picture of comprehension strategies in my head, I imagine new ideas for lessons will come up no matter what book I am reading. It's just nice to have a cheat sheet to start with. Excited about using this book as a jumping off point this year!

This book is just...... wow. I feel like it should be way more known in the teacher crowd than it is. Every elementary teacher should have this book. I kept reading chapter after chapter getting more and more excited, thinking-- this is what I've been looking for all along! Tanny takes each "big idea" comprehension strategy-- matacognition, schema, etc. and gives you a handful of perfect lessons to teach it. When I say perfect, I mean PERFECT. They are so engaging and cute, yet drive the idea home so no student will ever forget it. The lessons all start with something concrete, like paint color samples, salad bowls, a lint roller. These props are the things that make the lessons stick in kids' minds, yet they are the things that I am never creative enough to come up with on my own. After the idea is introduced with this concrete object, students explore it with wordless picture books and then move on to texts. I can't remember the last time I've been so excited about a teaching book. It definitely goes in my top 3 teaching books ever. (The other two are The Daily 5 and On Solid Ground.)

I think I have mentioned Comprehension Connections: Bridges to Strategic Reading by Tanny McGregor before, but it is an invaluable tool for any language arts teacher! Today I used one of the lesson suggestions for inference and it was a huge success! I brought in a bag of "trash" that I told my kids I took from my weird neighbor's porch. I really do have a weird neighbor, who I know very little about, so I described him. Then I told them we would be inferring information about him based on the items in his garbage. The kids had a BALL with it! By the end of the activity they were concerned for my safety based on what the inferred. It was great! In their independent reading, they are now working on an inference chart, making inferences about the main character in their novels and citing the evidence to back them up. So far it's going very well. If you don't already own this book, I highly recommend it!

This book is great. I just wish there was more examples. I feel like I needed a few more pages in each chapter so I could figure it out a little better. I do own "Strategies that Work" by Harvey which she refers to often in this book, and once I get through reading that, I'm sure I'll know. This book has wonderful examples of each strategy for reading comprehension. You can use these methods for pretty much any subject where comprehension is involved. McGregor uses lots of visuals in her classroom and since I homeschool, I'm not sure if I could hang as many posters as she does, but she gave some great examples. I also like that she has books listed at the end of each chapter for further reading. I have recommended this book to most of my homeschool friends. It's wonderful and helped me view comprehension and how kids can learn it in a very different light. Buy this book and also be sure to get Strategies that Work as well! The two go great together.

I have been teaching for 12 years and this is one of the best books on teaching reading comprehension strategies I have purchased in those 12 years! I have even bought it twice for student teachers I have had so they could start their career off with this book. It is a short practical read that you can put into practice immediately. My students really retain these strategies because of the creative concrete lessons that give them hooks for their schema. Well worth every penny and then some and I cannot say that about all the teacher books I have purchased over the years.

I LOVE this book! Teaching the skills and strategies that all good readers use is necessary for all elementary teachers. This text is so full of great ideas that are easy to implement in the classroom. The book is an easy read yet teaches great literacy practices that are simple, so effective and student friendly. I have bought multiple copies to give to my teacher friends. I will say it again, I LOVE this book!

I am a literacy leader at my school, and I just purchased one of these books for every grade level in the school. I also talked our county-wide literacy coach into purchasing a copy for every literacy leader in our district. I cannot say enough about how fantastic this book is. It is jam-packed with great strategies for introducing and/or reviewing reading standards. They are easily adapted for all elementary and even middle school grade levels. This book and Genre Connections should be on every reading teacher's professional library shelf!!

I've heard many teachers talk about Tanny McGregor's book for several years. I finally bought it and LOVE IT! The ideas are incredible and easy to adapt and implement in the classroom. It gave me different ideas to use and helped me to see things from a students perspective. I recommend this to anyone who is trying to make concrete connections for their students.

Great ideas on how to teach reading strategies in a concrete easy to understand way. Best teacher resource I've used ever.

I ordered this to support comprehension in my classroom and it was well worth it. It deals with the concept of metacognition and how it can be applied in the classroom. Even though I have been a teacher for a while, this book was a breath of fresh air. I have impliment many of the ideas. The children in my class are enjoying thinking about their learning in a different way. It is also very easy to read and not like some of the books you can buy on thinking that tend to have so much explanation and not enough practical application, that it is easy to give up. This book gets straight to the point. Highly recommended.

Although this is American, there are lots of great ideas that can be used in UK teaching too.