Teachers should explicitly teach good reading strategies.

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Explicit instruction in reading strategies helps students become independent, strategic readers. When teachers name and model specific strategies—predicting what might happen next, clarifying unfamiliar words or ideas, asking questions to check understanding, visualizing what is described, and summarizing what was read—students see exactly what good readers do and how to do it themselves. Through modeling, guided practice with feedback, and gradual release to independent work, learners build the habits and language they need to monitor their comprehension as they read.

This approach is the best choice because it equips all students with concrete tools they can apply across texts and genres, not just in one situation. It supports diverse learners, including those who struggle and English learners, by providing clear strategies and the scaffolding to use them. Rather than hoping students will figure out how to understand texts on their own, explicit strategy instruction gives them a reliable playbook for approaching reading.

It’s not about teaching these strategies only to advanced students or reserving them for later grades; introducing and reinforcing them early and continuing across grade levels helps students build strong, transferable reading habits from the start.