Welcome
This module introduces educators to the importance of post-reading strategies and how they support adolescent readers’ comprehension and critical thinking skills. After reading, students may struggle with summarizing key ideas, making inferences, or connecting new information to their prior knowledge. Implementing structured post-reading activities helps reinforce learning, deepen understanding, and promote long-term retention. You will explore how these strategies enhance students’ engagement with texts and foster critical analysis, discussion, and synthesis. Throughout this module, you will learn how post-reading activities can be used to strengthen students’ ability to reflect on and apply what they have read across various content areas.
Time Estimate: 3 hours
Welcome!
Welcome to the Adolescent Literacy series in the Ohio Literacy Library! This is an ever-expanding series featuring modules designed to support educators and other interested stakeholders of adolescents who desire to support their acquisition of literacy in the upper primary, middle, and high school grades. Strong literacy skills are essential for adolescents, as they are required to: (1) read to learn in a variety of disciplines; (2) build their knowledge by working with different text types, acquiring academic vocabulary, and sharing their ideas and impressions with others; and (3) master reading comprehension to take full advantage of instruction in content-area classes (Kamil et al., 2008). These skills are essential for success not only in upper grades, but beyond in the workplace and postsecondary education as well. This series aims to support readers with evidence-based practices that provide adolescent learners engaging and relevant practice both inside and outside the classroom.
Prerequisites
Completion of The Simple View of Reading comprehensive learning module, or sufficient background knowledge of the Simple View of Reading. Additionally, this module is intended to follow AL2. Pre-Reading Support and AL3. During-Reading Support.
Module Description
This module explores the role of post-reading support in reinforcing adolescent students’ comprehension, retention, and critical thinking skills. After providing foundational information about the purpose and importance of post-reading strategies, the module examines how these strategies help students (a) consolidate and extend their understanding of texts, (b) make connections between new information and prior knowledge, and (c) engage in deeper analysis through discussion, writing, and synthesis. Another major focus of this module is providing teachers with concrete examples of post-reading strategy planning and implementation, along with opportunities to practice and design effective post-reading activities for their own classrooms across different grade levels and content areas.
The module aligns with Recommendation #2: Provide direct and explicit comprehension strategy instruction and Recommendation #4: Increase student motivation and engagement in literacy learning in the Institute of Educational Sciences (IES) Practice Guide – Improving Adolescent Literacy: Effective Classroom and Intervention Practices. To this end, this module is designed to assist all educators, including English Language Arts and content-area teachers, in helping students gain more from their reading.
This module will:
- Increase your understanding of how to design effective post-reading activities that reinforce comprehension and critical thinking.
- Help you gain insight into the characteristics of post-reading strategies that address students’ retention, inference-making, and comprehension challenges.
- Introduce ways to incorporate post-reading activities across math, social studies, science, and language arts for middle and high school students.
Learning Objectives
Identify the purpose and characteristics of post-reading support in literacy development and common adolescent comprehension challenges
Identify the importance of post-reading support in supporting adolescent reading practices and comprehension
Characterize deep comprehension strategies and the teacher’s role in guiding critical analysis and reinforcing students’ literacy-based understanding
Review various post-reading activities and their applications across different content areas to enhance student comprehension and engagement
Recognize key strategies for supporting adolescent learners, including Universal Design for Learning (UDL), scaffolding techniques, and positive reinforcement
Consolidate key takeaways from the post-reading module, reflect on instructional practices, and identify next steps for continued professional growth
Course Navigation, Design, and Policies
Throughout each course, you will see a Course Outline with a green ribbon and the title of the course at the top right corner of the page. The outline displays every section of the course. Click any section to jump right to it.
At any time you are in a module, you can go back to the Home Module page by clicking the Back to Module button located directly under the module outline.
As you go through the course, you will have the opportunity to click the Mark Complete box at the end of each section. When you do this, the sections you have completed will be crossed off in your outline, and you will be taken to the next section of the course.
Your progress will automatically be saved within the learning management system, and you can view your course progress through the progress bar located near the top of most sections.
Exiting and Resuming a Module
Know that your progress will automatically be saved within the learning management system. If you exit the website, once you log back in you can easily access your courses by clicking the on the My Dashboard button located on the gray ribbon on top of every page.
Note Feature within the Modules
Throughout each module, you will notice some Reflection boxes that provide various prompts. Each reflection will be in a grey box with an image of a pen/lightbulb. A built in feature of each module is the ability to take notes and save them for your future use. This feature can be used within any part of the module, but is especially helpful for the reflection activities.
To access the note feature, simply click on the purple Take Notes button fixed in the lower right-hand corner of the screen. When you click on this button, a Take Notes box will appear. This box can be moved anywhere on the screen. Within the box, there is a SAVE button as well as a Print Button.
The easiest way to print all the notes you take from the entire module is to click View All Notes. When you click View All Notes, you will be taken to a page like the one below.
Click the boxes of the Notes you would like to print, and then click Download Selected. All your notes will be downloaded into one document separated by headers.
All Ohio’s comprehensive learning modules are relevant to any educator working to support students’ literacy development. In each module, you will find in-depth narrative text, linked resources, realistic scenarios, reflection activities, and embedded audio and videos.
Each module is self-paced. The approximate time for completion of the module is listed in the Simple View of Reading Module text box on the home page of the module.
Additional information included on each module’s home page include:
- Required prerequisites for the module.
- A more detailed description of the module.
- Helpful downloadable resources for the module including an outline of the module’s content and supporting resources, a step-by-step guide to assist you in navigating the professional learning modules, and an in-depth information about the purpose and key elements of the Ohio Literacy Library.
Certificates
Professional Development Certificates
are available for each comprehensive learning module. To earn a Professional Development Certificate, you must obtain a passing score of 85% or more on the module post-test. Please note that you are only allowed up to two attempts to obtain a passing score to earn your certificate.Badges
When completing professional development modules within All Ohio, you can earn badges based on your engagement in and mastery of content within each comprehensive learning module. You earn
Achievement Badges when you demonstrate proficiency with module content (i.e., obtaining a score of at least 85%), whereas Engagement Badges are awarded based on your level of participation on the site. Your earned Certificates and Badges will be displayed on your “All Ohio Dashboard.”
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Helpful Resources Related to this Module
Module Resources
An outline of the module’s main content and supporting resources.
Welcome & Navigation
Step-by-step guide to assist you in navigating the professional learning modules.