Nell K. Duke's strategies for teaching informational text comprehension

¶ … Nell K. Duke, the author implores the reader to see informational text at the earliest stages of childhood education to stress informational text in conjunction with areas of curiosity and interest for students. Advocating a series of learning strategies that includes increasing the students' access to information text, planning class time to allow students to spend more time working with informational text in instructional activities, explicitly and as the author suggest, passionately teaching comprehension strategies, and creating opportunities for students to use informational text for authentic purposes anchor the main points of the article. In addition, the author makes the point that for informational text to be truly relevant and absorbed to the level a student is capable of comprehending at their specific skill level, the information text books and sources need to pique their curiosity and interest. This is common sense yet for many students the exposure to informational text is purely in response to teachers' specific requirements for reading. The author's implicit message is that it is a far better teaching practice to deliver informational text that is aligned with the specific interests of students. In the latter parts of the article, the author applies these lessons learned to older readers struggling to increase their reading comprehension.