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Clarifying Differences Between Reading Skills and Reading Strategies
Clarifying Differences Between Reading Skills and Reading Strategies
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Wiley and International Literacy Association are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve
and extend access to The Reading Teacher
The Reading Teacher, 67(5), pp. 364-373 ? 2008 International Reading Association
364 DOI:10.1598/RT.61.5.1 ISSN: 0034-0561 print/1936-2714 online
ience rather than a principled process. In our experi strategy n. in education, a systematic plan, conscious
ences, there are three main sources of confusion: ly adapted and monitored, to improve one's perform
diverse colloquial uses, inadequate definitions, and ance in learning, (p. 244)
inconsistent use in formal documents.
Knowing that professionals who teach reading use These definitions are helpful, but they do not clar
the terms reading skill and reading strategy almost dai ify thoroughly the distinctions between skills and
ly in their work, we began our inquiry by asking our strategies or the relations between them. In particu
colleagues (teachers, graduate and undergraduate ed lar, note that skill is associated with the proficiency of
ucation students, and professors of education) to tell a complex act, and strategy is associated with a con
us what each term meant and to describe how they scious and systematic plan. These features may help
might be related. Consider the variability in respons differentiate the terms as we discuss them later.
es we received: Next, we searched the Internet for "reading stan
dards" for clues about how professional organizations
"Skills make up strategies."
define skills and strategies. The website for the
"Strategies lead to skills." National Council of Teachers of English mentioned
"Skill is the destination, strategy is the journey." skills in the overview of the Standards for the English
"We learn strategies to do a skill." Language Arts (International Reading Association &
National Council of Teachers of English, 1996):
"Skills are automatic, strategies are effortful and
mediated." The vision guiding these standards is that all students
must have the opportunities and resources to develop
"We use strategies as tools."
the language skills they need to pursue life's goals and to
"Strategies that work require a skill set." participate fully as informed, productive members of so
"We have to pay attention in learning skills, but ciety, (n.p)
eventually we use them automatically."
Strategies are mentioned in Standard 3:
"You don't think about skills, and you do think
about strategies." Students apply a wide range of strategies to compre
hend, interpret, evaluate, and appreciate texts. They
draw on their prior experience, their interactions with
The method and sample are limited, but we think
other readers and writers, their knowledge of word
that the responses illustrate several things. First, when
meaning and of other texts, their word identification
asked, people are ready and willing to describe read strategies, and their understanding of textual features
ing skills and strategies, and everyone seems confi (e.g., sound-letter correspondence, sentence structure,
dent in their own understanding. Second, the context, graphics), (n.p.)
mined by scoring at least 80% correct on a skill test lar line of instructional research suggesting their ef
(Bloom, 1968). Once these skills emphasis manage fectiveness (see Paris, Lipson, & Wixson, 1983;
ment systems made their way into the basal readers Pearson & Fielding, 1991; and Pressley, 2000, for arti
of that era, their presence as a fact of life in everyday cles summarizing the impact of this work). They are
reading instruction went virtually unchallenged until prominent in today's basal readers and are positioned
the late 1980s and early 1990s when, for a brief half alongside skills as a supportive but independent line
decade, they were banished from center stage. The of instruction. It is this independent relation between
discontent with skills began in the 1970s with the pub skills and strategies that, in our view, promotes confu
lication of articles like, "Skills Management Systems: A sion between the terms.
they are under automatic or deliberate control. This nunciations. A hoped for consequence of instruction
is a key difference between skill and strategy. is that students' decoding progresses from deliberate
It is important to note that reading strategies, like to fluent actions. Children in elementary school, es
reading skills, are not always successful, and a defini pecially when reading instruction focuses on con
tion of reading strategies does not entail only positive structing meaning, learn to find main ideas, to skim,
and useful actions. A young reader may choose an in and to reread first as deliberate actions and, with prac
appropriate goal, such as reading fast to finish before tice, later accomplish the same actions with less ef
peers rather than reading carefully to understand the fort and awareness. In this view of learning, deliberate
text. Some strategies are simply incorrect ideas about reading strategies often become fluent reading skills.
reading, such as guessing a word based on its initial Skills and strategies may serve the same goals and
letter. The actions are indeed strategic; they connect may result in the same behavior. For example, readers
specific means to specific goals butthfey are inappro may decode words, read a text fluently, or find a main
priate and ineffective for reading. Having good inten idea using either skills or strategies (or both). The dis
tions and trying to be strategic are good starting points tinction is often not very important to the student or
but neither alone ensures that readers will decode teacher but across time movement from deliberate
and understand text successfully. It is the appropri and effortful to fluent and automatic is a good thing.