Reading comprehension is an important part of early school programmes and it is the ability to read and understand a text with its meaning. 

Reading ability evolves from word reading to comprehension. In primary schools, it starts with phonics for word reading practice. 

To make sense of what has been read the child is encouraged to understand the meaning of words and that process is generally called comprehension.

From phonics to comprehension

The focus shifts from phonics to comprehension from Year 2 onwards will as the child becomes good at word reading.

The key stage 2 is the four years of schooling in England known as Year 3, 4, 5 and 6 when the pupils are in the age band between 7 and 11 years. The KS2 phase is very important for students as they are introduced, nurtured and groomed to optimize abilities of comprehension as part of the reading abilities faculty.     

In the Key Stage 2 English comprehensions will have a variety of texts in terms of poems, stories, prose, rhymes etc. The outcome desired will be the following.

• The understanding of the literal meaning of the text
• Deriving inferences 
• Observing the structure of writing
• Identify literary devices

 Good comprehension requires knowledge and skills

It is important to impart more knowledge and skills to school children Good for better comprehension.  According to education expert Nikkie Gamble, better comprehension is achieved by strengthening certain areas of KS2 students. For this teachers have to pay attention to the following areas.                  

Expand students’ vocabulary: Most children will feel challenged when new words appear that are unfamiliar and had not been a part of the spoken vocabulary.

They include technical words as well as words with multiple meanings. This needs to be remedied by guiding children to look at words in different contexts and understand the nuances. For practice, write down challenging words in a journal with definitions in their own words.

Gleaning inference: In creating a complete meaning of text readers have to exercise existing knowledge to fill up the gaps. For primary class students, a story discussed in groups will help in comprehending better by finding answers to questions that arise and predictions about the characters and events in the story.

Help in enlarging memory: Readers have to apply both long-term and working memory in deriving the meaning of a given text. In the case of children, their long-term memory is limited and care has to be taken not to overburden the working memory.

To address this problem giving advanced background information to children before reading out a story will be the best way with the advice to re-read difficult portions at their pace.

Also, KS2 pupils can be introduced to graphic texts so that they can develop skills of inference and critical thinking. Explain the text and ask them to take note of the interplay between words and the connection with pictures in building and conveying a better sense to the reader.

Increase speed: Gradually students must earn the ability to read significant amounts of challenging texts faster and answer questions within a time frame by more practice. 

For this teachers ought to focus on developing speed by building their capacity for independent comprehension of suitable texts.