Click or Clunk?

While reading a science or social studies text, it is important that students remind themselves that this is not a story to read quickly and skim over parts. Just about everything written in a science or social studies textbook is comprised of facts and new learning that students need. Reading slowly and rereading is the way to handle a science textbook.

During pre-reading, the SCAN part, students asked questions about the reading. While reading, students are trying to answer those questions. Discussion directors can bring up new questions throughout the reading; this is not only a good practice, but can lead to great research projects. After reading a paragraph, the reader needs to ask if that paragraph clicked or clunked. If it clicked, then it made sense and the reader can continue reading. If the paragraph clunked, then the reader asks what s/he can do to make sense of the reading. Maybe defining vocabulary words, discussing the paragraph or section, or rereading the paragraph or section will do the trick.

SCAN & RUN can work with websites as well. Readers can use whatever sections of the SCAN & RUN work and leave out any section that doesn't work. The Click or Clunk strategy is very useful for reading websites. Reading websites to answer specific questions is also a good strategy, such as when researching for a project.