Text Connections: An Effective Reading Strategy

A powerful and effective reading strategy is making text connections. Good readers are able to think about the characters and issues that occur in a book and relate them to their own lives. Our first graders are practicing this strategy in reading workshop.

The Hating Book by Charlotte Zolotow was a favorite recently read by first grade students. Two girls misinterpret a conversation and become very angry at each other. When they finally realize their mistake, they laugh and their friendship is strengthened. We all worried when the girls were angry and experienced hurt feelings and felt so relieved at the end when they were friends again. Students shared their text connections with a partner and then wrote about the event from the text and then their own personal connection.

First graders continue to practice this skill while reading books with a partner, engaging in conversation about their connections and then writing about their own experience. Second, third and fourth graders continue to make connections to their own lives, to other books they have read and to the world. Recent book group selections Frog and Toad Are Friends and Mouse and Mole, Fine Feathered Friends in second grade explored issues of friendship and problem solving, topics that lend themselves to forging connections with the text to their personal lives. Third graders reading Stink and the Great Guinea Pig Express and Ivy and Bean Book 1 and fourth graders reading Justin and the Best Biscuits in the World, Mayfield Crossing and Riding Freedom are exploring book group selections that effectively contain topics and characters that students can connect to their own lives. During discussions in all of these book groups, one can often hear a student making a connection to their own lives, another book they have read or an important issue in the world.