Differentiating Comprehension from the Components of Reading
By Hugh W. Catts, Alan G. Kamhi
The idea of differentiating comprehension from the other components of reading was suggested over 15 years ago by Alan Kamhi (the second author).6 He argued that many assessments of reading conflated word reading accuracy and fluency with comprehension, which could lead to misconceptions about why children performed poorly on reading tests. Was it due to their inability to accurately or fluently read words, their inability to comprehend, or both? To address this problem, he argued that reading should be viewed narrowly as just word recognition. This narrow view of reading would include the components of phonological awareness, phonics, and fluency. Comprehension (and vocabulary) in this view is treated as a separate and distinct cognitive process and ability. In a companion article, Hugh Catts (the first author) argued that adopting a narrow view of reading leads to a broader view of comprehension, one that goes beyond skill-based notions and recognizes the similarity of reading and listening comprehension.7
In proposing and advocating for this narrow view, we had no expectations that it would be widely accepted by educators or policymakers because the skill-based approach to comprehension has long been entrenched in the research and educational communities. In recent years, however, there have been significant advancements in the science of how to teach and assess comprehension that are beginning to impact educational practices. At the forefront is the movement toward providing integrated comprehension and knowledge instruction within content-rich literacy curricula. In these curricula, which are often implemented during English language arts (ELA) class time, students are taught the appropriate strategies (i.e., ways of thinking), vocabulary, and language needed to understand texts on subject-specific topics drawn from science, history, and the arts as well as more traditional ELA content. This instruction is also combined with oral discussions, hands-on activities, and writing opportunities with the goal of facilitating literacy and increasing knowledge. This is similar to the broad view of comprehension that we had advocated for in our earlier papers.
