As students complete the arduous task of passing the GED or completing an alternative high school diploma, they have acquired a wide range of reading comprehension skills and they have achieved an important milestone. Some students will want to continue in postsecondary education. But often, teachers have not introduced the reading skills and strategies these students will need to succeed in a college setting. College students have to cope with a large amount of reading, with lengthy texts in scientific, historical, and technical areas. In this article, I will discuss strategies and skills in reading instruction for students moving from a small and often supportive adult basic education classroom into a large and often impersonal college setting.

The Print dialog box is where you also set the size attribute ratios. These settings are percentage multipliers used to scale the current font whenever relative size at tributes are applied. For example, if the current font has a size of 10 points, and the Large size attributes ratio in the Print Preferences dialogue box is set to 120%, then anywhere the Large attribute is applied in the document, the character size changes to 12 points, which is 120% of 10 points (10 x 120% = 12).

Ready to read on with confidence and comprehension or are you ready to cry, give up or ask someone for help? Is this how your student feels when an instructor assigns a reading from a college text? Using my computer, I checked the readability score of this document. It has about an 11th grade level equivalency, suggesting that most 11th graders could read and understand the passage. So with a masters degree in education, I should be able to read and comprehend this passage with ease.

But I can't. I can't read and understand this passage without accessing an array of comprehension skills and strategies that I don't use every day. I have to be an active and strategic reader. I have to ask and answer certain questions and draw on certain reading skills that will help me read independently. Below is a list of these strategies and skills, drawn from Bloom's Taxonomy, that I must use to understand the paragraph. The same skills can be taught to students as they encounter unfamiliar, challenging texts.

1. Why Am I Reading This?
Why do I need or want to read this text: what's in it for me both as an immediate goal and as a part of who I am and what I want? Answering this question creates a context for becoming an active reader. It sets a purpose for reading and establishes motivation. It moves me away from passively accepting the text, which limits comprehension. I am making the choice to read, comprehend, and use the information I learn from the text. Answering thewhy helps me, and any reader, accept the discomfort that comes from not immediately knowing how to approach the text.

Why should I read the computer paragraph? As an immediate goal, I need to know how to use my computer and I can't always rely on other people to help me troubleshoot. In the longer term, using the computer is part of my job, and I want a sense of independence and accomplishment. So I will endure the discomfort I will experience in the process of finding the skills to help me understand this passage.

Helping students to establish a reason for enduring difficult texts, even when the immediate goal isn't readily apparent, is a good first step toward developing active reading skills. hey can select different skills necessary for reading in different genres. Reading a novel is different from reading a technical manual, and teachers need to teach these differences explicitly. In my case, identifying my paragraph as an excerpt from a dreaded but necessary manual-like book, Using Word Perfect, sets me up for doing a certain kind of reading

2. What Type of Text Am I Reading?
To help me comprehend the computer paragraph, I must identify the type of text so I can use appropriate reading strategies. I know that I am reading a technical passage that involves math, so I will read methodically to get specific information and analyze information from tables, formulas, equations, understand specialized vocabulary.

Students, too, must identify the type of text they are reading so hey can select different skills necessary for reading in different genres. Reading a novel is different from reading a technical manual, and teachers need to teach these differences explicitly. In my case, identifying my paragraph as an excerpt from a dreaded but necessary manual-like book, Using WordPerfect, sets me up for doing a certain kind of reading.

3. What Do I Already Know About This?
I draw upon my prior knowledge of computers and my personal experiences with computers to help me understand the paragraph. This reflection, along with my knowledge of the type of text-the dreaded technical manual- allows me to understand the vocabulary in context. The words dialog, attribute, and character have many meanings, but I understand that this is a manual on computers, not a poem by Shakespeare, so I read accordingly.

Students, too, must access their prior knowledge of a topic and of the type 0f text they are reading. They can ask: "What do I already know about this subject? When have I read a similar kind of book, and how did I do it?" Teachers can assist students in activating their prior knowledge through prereading activities. They can also help increase a student's knowledge of a difficult subject by reading lower-level materials to build that missing knowledge base. Students can learn to do this themselves by seeking out materials on a similar subject written at a lower level in order to build background knowledge.

4. How Can I Get the Big Picture of What I'll Be Reading?
In my case, I'm trying to understand a short excerpt from a longer manual. Still, it helps me to skim the manual so I know how that paragraph fits into the longer text. Then I can locate more information if I need to.

If students can establish a big picture for what they are reading, they can increase their comprehension of, say, a chapter of a text. They can skim the chapter for basic ideas, scan for specific information, use titles and headlines to predict what they will be reading about. By establishing a kind of scaffold before reading, their chances of understanding that chapter are much better than if they open to page one and start reading.

5. How Will I Evaluate the Material I am Reading?
In the case of the computer paragraph, my ability to evaluate the cause-effect relationship and to verify the value of evidence in this passage will allow me to apply it to a concrete situation when I need to. If I have read the paragraph correctly, I should be able to set the six attribute ratios for my fonts. If I can't do it, I have to read it over again.

When students read longer and more complex materials-social sciences, history, applied sciences, for example, they will have to use a variety of reading skills: they will have to evaluate fact vs. opinion and assess the value of theories. They will have to compare and discriminate between ideas and theories based on following and evaluating reasoned arguments. All of these skills need modeling and explicit teaching in the GED or ASE classroom because they do not come as naturally as, say, reading a story or narrative.

To read my computer paragraph successfully, I had to draw on skills I don't use regularly. As an advanced reader, I access those skills unconsciously. But our students must learn these skills through explicit exposure and practice, if they are to succeed in college level reading.

Jessica Spohn has workin in education for 15 years. She currently coordinates the ABE-to-College Tranistion Project at the NELRC/World Education and can be reached either at 617-482-9485 or at jspohn@worlded.org