How to Teach Background Knowledge for Reading Comprehension in First Grade | Writing About Reading Series

How do you teach first graders to use background knowledge while reading? In this episode of The Education Connection, Robin Wilson shares a simple, first-grade-friendly way to introduce background knowledge, also called schema, as a reading comprehension strategy.

Robin shares how she begins with a big-brain anchor chart and asks one simple question: “What do you know?” As students share everything from dinosaurs to Minecraft and Roblox, they begin to understand that their brains are already filled with knowledge from their experiences, learning, and reading.

Then Robin takes the strategy to a book. After reading, students draw and write about one thing they already ...