Strategy: Dialogic Reading

The Learning Benefits

Dialogic Reading engages learners with the content they are reading by prompting them to respond to contextual questions. Here are the key benefits:

• Encourages students to actively participate in what they’re learning, orienting their attention and improving retention.
• Strengthens interpretive and expressive communication skills.
• Expands relevant academic vocabulary.
• Develops academic reading comprehension.

Classroom Tactics

Early childhood educators frequently use a Dialogic Reading strategy to guide and prompt younger readers. This strategy, however, is applicable to learners of all ages. Here are some ways to incorporate Dialogic Reading into instruction across all grade levels:

• During read alouds in whole or small group, use the PEER (Prompt, Evaluate, Expand, Revisit) method to engage students in ways to think about the text being read.
• Provide guided or independent readers with graphic organizers that prompt them to reflect on the text before, during, and after reading.
• Engage students in partner reading of a shared text. Identify stop points throughout the text as well as prompts for students to initiate discussion.

How Speak Agent Makes It Better

Speak Agent courses come with reading activities that engage students in real-world math and science stories. These stories use the content language that students are currently learning in your math or science classroom. All Speak Agent reading activities also integrate visual aids and language supports, such as text magnification, text-to-speech narration, highlighting, dimming, and in-line translation, ensuring accessibility for all learners.

Read Alongs are mini e-books in Speak Agent that use Dialogic Reading as a strategy to help students develop comprehension of the key academic concepts and related vocabulary. Students read or listen to each page and then respond to a targeted prompt before continuing. The prompts may be open-ended questions, invitations to reflect or to explain ideas, or questions with a specific correct answer. Students may respond by typing and/or by speaking a short answer, based on teacher guidance. All student responses are saved to their digital portfolios, where teachers may review them.