Reading Comprehension Teaching Resources
Explore printable worksheets, digital activities and more to teach reading comprehension strategies and skills in your elementary classroom. Created by teachers, for teachers, the teaching resources in this collection are curriculum-aligned and have undergone a careful review by a member of our expert teaching team.
You'll find editable versions to easily differentiate your instruction for individual students, plus a variety of options to make lesson planning easier this school year so your students will be able to identify the main idea of a text, draw inferences, remember key details and more.
New to teaching this portion of the English curriculum or just looking for fresh and engaging ways to teach reading comprehension strategies? Read on for a primer from our teacher team!
What Is Reading Comprehension?
We'll start at the beginning! Reading comprehension is a skill that's hard to overestimate in terms of its importance for elementary students to develop.
Defined as the ability to understand and interpret written language, reading comprehension involves the process of decoding text, extracting meaning from it, and then integrating that meaning with prior knowledge and understanding.
Not only does comprehension comprise the ability to recognize and understand individual words, but it also involves the ability to recognize patterns and relationships within sentences and paragraphs.
On top of that is the ability to make inferences and draw conclusions based on the information presented.
Yes, there's a lot packed in there!
How to Teach Reading Comprehension
To develop reading comprehension, students need a variety of language skills such as vocabulary knowledge, grammar and syntax, as well as cognitive processes such as attention, memory and critical thinking.
So how do you teach reading comprehension? Like many of those foundational skills we teach in elementary grades, this isn't something kids learn in a single lesson, unit or even one school year.
Teaching reading comprehension is going to stretch from kindergarten and first grade all the way through the rest of a child's academic career (at least on the pre-college levels).
That said, here are some activities to make use of as you approach teaching reading comprehension as an elementary teacher:
- Pre-Reading Activities — Brainstorming, KWL charts, prediction exercises and other "pre-reading" activities will help your students activate their prior knowledge, build background knowledge and set a purpose for reading. These are all key to developing their comprehension.
- During-Reading Strategies — Teaching your students to ask questions, summarize, visualize and make connections will give students the know-how they need to monitor their comprehension as they read.
- Post-Reading Activities — Reading comprehension doesn't stop when kids get to the last page of a text. It's only just beginning. That's why it's important to make sure your lesson plans include activities that help students deepen their understanding of the text and develop critical thinking skills. Examples of post-reading activities that can help build these skills include discussions, debates and written responses.
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Story Elements Graphic Organizers – Portrait
Encourage your students to write and draw about various story elements with this set of differentiated graphic organizers.
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Paired Passage Worksheets-Mammals vs. Reptiles
Compare mammals vs. reptiles and add to your reading instruction with leveled nonfiction, compare and contrast passages and worksheets.
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Free Character Traits List
Teach your students to analyze characters more effectively by providing them with a list of character traits.
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‘Imagine if…’ Changing Setting Worksheet Set
Use this Imagine If… Changing Settings Worksheet Set to spark creativity and deepen comprehension as students explore how changing a story’s setting transforms the entire narrative.
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Making Reading Connections Using Comics
Get your students making reading connections with these engaging comics and accompanying worksheets that help students link what they read to their own experiences, other texts and the wider world.
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Arctic Fox Adaptations - Free Comprehension Worksheet
Read and learn about Arctic fox adaptations with a set of printable Reading Comprehension Worksheets for 2nd and 3rd grade.
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Character Traits Graphic Organizer
Describe the most notable mental and moral qualities of a real or fictional person.
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Emotion Match Passages Worksheet Pack
Help your students strengthen emotional vocabulary and early inferencing skills with this engaging set of Feeling Inferencing passages.
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Free Story Prediction Worksheet
Encourage students to think critically before reading with this Story Prediction Worksheet.
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Making Connections Worksheet Set
Allow your students to record their connections to a particular text with this Making Connections Worksheet set.
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Human Histories: World Explorers – Comprehension Worksheet
A free comprehension worksheet paired with an informational text about world explorers.
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Story Elements - Worksheet
Practice identifying characters, settings, problems and solutions in fictional texts with this set of worksheets.
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Note-Taking Practice Worksheets
Use this set of note-taking practice worksheets to help your students identify key facts, details and vocabulary when researching information.
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Environmental Print Activities
Use these Environmental Print Activities to introduce early readers to the power of everyday words and logos.
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Making Inferences Comprehension Task Cards and Worksheets
Download this set of comprehension task cards with your students to help them draw conclusions and make inferences when reading.
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Should Smartphones Be Allowed in Class? Comprehension Worksheets
Decide if cellphones should be allowed in class and boost comprehension skills with a reading passage and comprehension test.
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Exploring Figurative Language in Poetry Workbook
Teach your upper elementary and middle school students to read, analyze, and discuss poetry with a printable and digital poetry workbook.
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Halloween Worksheet — Bat Facts and Opinions
Practice identifying facts and opinions with a Halloween worksheet activity about bats.
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Sequence Persuasive Text Examples – Cut and Paste Worksheets
Use this example persuasive text pack to teach your students about sequencing arguments in a logical order.
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Informative Paragraphs Sequencing Activity
Teach your students about informational text paragraph structure with this hands-on sequencing activity.
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Text Purpose Matching Activity
Use this Text Purpose Matching Up Activity to help students explore how different text types serve different purposes.
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Exploring Earthquakes Comprehension Worksheets
Give your students a clear, engaging introduction to earthquakes, what causes them, and how scientists measure them with printable Earthquakes Comprehension Worksheets.
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Sophia the Superdog - Comprehension Text and Questions
A superdog themed text and set of questions to help develop comprehension strategies in the classroom.
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Making Connections Reading Comprehension Passages
Teach the making connections reading comprehension strategy with this set of five engaging short stories and differentiated graphic organizers that help students build meaningful text-to-self, text-to-text and text-to-world connections.
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Comparing Texts on the Same Topic Worksheet
Explore the purpose of poem texts and report texts with clear guidance that helps students' interpretive skills.
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Triple Venn Diagram Template
Download a printable Triple Venn Diagram Template to use when comparing and contrasting three topics.
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Fiction and Nonfiction Sorting Cards
Explore fiction and nonfiction book features with this sorting activity.
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Mood Anchor Chart- Literary Element Poster
Introduce your students to mood, the atmosphere-creating literary element, with a printable Mood Anchor Chart.
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Reading Response Task Cards
Explore reading comprehension with your students using this set of reading response task cards.
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Self Monitoring Reading Strategy Poster
Help students reflect on their reading with this Self Monitoring Reading Strategy Poster.
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Free Author’s Purpose Handout
Use this Author’s Purpose Handout in the form of a brochure to explore the different reasons authors write.
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Bloom’s Taxonomy - Second Grade Reading Comprehension Questions
Grow comprehension skills with our Reading Comprehension - Second Grade Bloom’s Taxonomy Reading Task Cards.
- Reading Comprehension Worksheets
- Reading Comprehension Templates
- Reading Comprehension Games
- Reading Comprehension Posters
- Reading Comprehension Flashcards
- Reading Comprehension for Pre-K
- Reading Comprehension for Kindergarten
- Reading Comprehension for 1st Grade
- Reading Comprehension for 2nd Grade
- Reading Comprehension for 3rd Grade
- Reading Comprehension for 4th Grade
- Reading Comprehension for 5th Grade
- Reading Comprehension for 6th Grade