Online Only, Synchronous and Asynchronous | Reading comprehension instruction focuses on research and exemplary practices that help students acquire strong reading comprehension skills. RCI is appropriate for all K-12 teachers and support staff who need to help increase their students’ comprehension of text- whether that text is a literature selection or informational.  The course provides participants with a synthesis of the research based on reading comprehension instruction and vocabulary development. Participants examine, discuss, and evaluate the appropriate application of a range of instructional strategies from explicit to implicit teaching of comprehension skills. Strategies are presented for increasing student comprehension of both narrative and expository texts. In addition, participants learn how to help students self- monitor comprehension and apply appropriate strategies to fix the problem when comprehension is not achieved. Practice in using instructional strategies and examples of student work is embedded in the course.

Participants will be able to:

• Develop an understanding of research and exemplary practices that help students acquire strong comprehension and vocabulary skills
• Examine the requirements of literacy content standards: regular practice with complex texts; using evidence from text when reading, writing, and speaking; attending to academic vocabulary; and building knowledge through content rich nonfiction.
• Understand the nature of narrative text and expository text and how they can both aid and hinder comprehension.
• Learn how to build and support dialogic discourse in classrooms through student-centered strategies to support comprehension.
• Recognize the relationship between comprehension and vocabulary knowledge.