If your child has difficulty reading, you might want to take a step back and think about what you want your child to understand from his or her reading.  Aside from reading more slowly and trying to sound out words, you can ask your child to find specific kinds of information in a story, or help your child summarize the essential points of the reading.  You can do this before you help your child identify the main ideas of a story and determine the theme, moral, or main idea.

     Studies show that direct intervention of parent or tutor in the comprehension process increases reading comprehension in slower readers (Bos, 1982). If your child has difficulty reading, he or she might need help with vocabulary and need reminders to summarize as he or she proceeds. You should also have your child ask him or herself questions about what he or she is reading. You can prompt thinking or can provide an insight into the language that may otherwise be difficult for your child.

     One effective strategy that may benefit your child is to generate visual images of what is being read.  For your child to generate images (visualization), he or she must first be able to recognize the word.  Once your child knows how to recognize words, he or she needs concepts to visualize the part that is being represented on the page.

     This technique works for all readers. Your child, who may have problems reading however, gains more from images than from abstract discussions. It is not enough for you to simply tell your child to use visual images—you have to describe the images that occur in your own mind as you read a particular passage, thus giving your child a concrete sense of what visual imagery means.  This will give your child a wider vocabulary and improve his or her ability to express thoughts from text.  You can then impart this skill (i.e. visualization) to your child by reading aloud content rich texts.  Once your child improves visualization skills from your read aloud, you can help your child apply the same techniques when he or she reads independently.

     For your older child (grades 4-8) you can help your child overcome reading comprehension difficulties by helping your child with reading strategies such as: inferring, questioning, finding the main idea, and making connections.