Reading is an interesting journey one embarks on. The reader makes a connection with the characters, their situations, and the settings in which the stories take place. Reading aloud is the foundation for literacy development. It is the single mostimportant activity for reading success, providing children with a demonstration of phrased, fluent reading. Ms Dalbir Kaur’s session on the Reading Programme conducted on the 30th of August, 2022, not only helped the pre-primary and primary teachers to understand the art of reading but also gave them valuable inputs to facilitate the learners to think aloud, with the help of various strategies. Teachers were suggested to verbalize aloud while reading a selection orally. Their verbalizations included describing things they’re doing as they read to monitor their comprehension. The purpose of the think-aloud strategy is to model for students how skilled readers construct meaning from a text by setting a routine and purpose for a read-aloud. She demonstrated effective thinking aloud strategies to foster comprehension, by choosing and planning the right book, connecting the text to self, stopping at the “juicy points, stop and jot, turn and talk and encouraging children to make a “mind movie” as they learn to visualise as they listen to a book being read aloud, creating an engaging environment in the classroom. It was a great learning opportunity for all the teachers who attended the session.
