MTEL Reading Comprehension 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: Reciprocal Teaching, a comprehension strategy referenced on the MTEL Foundations of Reading, incorporates which four strategies?
- Visualize, connect, question, evaluate
- Predict, clarify, question, summarize (Correct answer)
- Skim, scan, read, review
- Activate, read, respond, reflect
Correct answer: Predict, clarify, question, summarize
Palincsar and Brown's Reciprocal Teaching uses four strategies — predicting, clarifying, questioning, and summarizing — applied in collaborative structured dialogue.
Question 2: A teacher thinks aloud while reading a challenging passage, verbalizing confusion and the strategies used to resolve it. On the MTEL Foundations of Reading, this is called:
- Shared reading
- A think-aloud (Correct answer)
- Guided reading
- Choral reading
Correct answer: A think-aloud
A think-aloud makes invisible comprehension processes visible by having the teacher verbalize thoughts, confusions, and strategies during oral reading.
Question 3: Which statement about the KWL strategy (Know, Want to know, Learned), used in comprehension instruction on the MTEL Foundations of Reading, is most accurate?
- KWL is designed primarily for fiction texts and story grammar
- KWL activates prior knowledge, sets a purpose for reading, and supports post-reading reflection on learning (Correct answer)
- KWL should only be used with struggling readers as a remediation tool
- KWL replaces all other pre-reading strategies for informational text
Correct answer: KWL activates prior knowledge, sets a purpose for reading, and supports post-reading reflection on learning
KWL engages students before, during, and after reading by activating what they already know, focusing their purpose, and consolidating new learning.
Question 4: On the MTEL Foundations of Reading, which level of questioning requires students to synthesize information from multiple parts of a text?
- Literal (right there) questions
- Inferential questions requiring text-to-text synthesis (Correct answer)
- Vocabulary questions about word meaning
- Questions about text layout and formatting
Correct answer: Inferential questions requiring text-to-text synthesis
Inferential questions requiring synthesis ask students to pull information from multiple text sections or texts and combine it with reasoning, representing higher-order comprehension.
Question 5: According to the MTEL Foundations of Reading, which practice best supports students' ability to summarize informational text?
- Copying the first sentence of each paragraph as the summary
- Teaching students to identify main ideas and supporting details and to condense them in their own words (Correct answer)
- Summarizing by listing all details mentioned in the passage
- Reading the passage multiple times until the student can recite it
Correct answer: Teaching students to identify main ideas and supporting details and to condense them in their own words
Effective summarization requires students to distinguish main ideas from supporting details and restate essential information concisely in their own words.
Question 6: Comprehension monitoring, as emphasized on the MTEL Foundations of Reading, refers to a reader's ability to:
- Read at grade-level speed without stopping
- Recognize when understanding has broken down and apply fix-up strategies to restore meaning (Correct answer)
- Decode all words in a passage without errors
- Identify all vocabulary words that require instruction before reading
Correct answer: Recognize when understanding has broken down and apply fix-up strategies to restore meaning
Comprehension monitoring is a metacognitive skill in which readers notice when they have lost understanding and take strategic action (re-reading, asking questions) to restore it.
MTEL Reading Comprehension 2
Reciprocal Teaching, a comprehension strategy referenced on the MTEL Foundations of Reading, incorporates which four strategies?