How do good readers understand what they read?

How do good readers understand what they read? Reading researchers Pressley and Wharton-McDonald identify the following cognitive or thinking processes used by skilled readers.


Before reading:

• Good readers have clear reading goals.
• Good readers overview the text in order to determine whether the text is worth reading, identify goal-relevant sections of the text, and develop a reading plan.

During reading:

• Good readers generally progress from beginning to end of the text.
• Good readers give differential attention to information that is relevant to their goals.
• Good readers sometimes jump forward and backward to find particular information and to clarify confusions as they arise. They are aware of confusions because they monitor as they read.
• Good readers anticipate what might be said, updating their predictions and hypotheses as they read.
• Good readers relate prior knowledge to the ideas in the text and relate ideas in the text to one another. They revise old ideas and make inferences during reading.
• Good readers sometimes use strategies as they read, for example, to determine the meanings of unknown words or to remember particular ideas.
• Good readers demonstrate passion for certain ideas presented in the text.
• Good readers construct interpretations and conclusions as reading proceeds.

After reading:

• Good readers sometimes reread or re-skim the text just read.
• Good readers sometimes attempt to restate important ideas from the text. If notes might help later recall, they take them.
• Good readers continue to reflect on the text after they have finished reading.

In summary, the authors describe skilled readers as strategic, metacognitive, and motivated, and present evidence that these more active readers understand what they read better than less active readers.