In this video, adult educator instructor Kay Combs helps students activate their prior knowledge about a text in order to summarize it and increase their reading comprehension. The students use what they already know to inform their understanding of new information in the reading.

Combs and the students begin working through a K-W-L chart, which asks the readers to write down what they already know about a text, what they would like to find out, and what they learned. Just by examining the title, author, and graphic elements of a text, readers can begin to make assumptions based on their previous experiences and predictions about what they are about to read. Filling out the K-W-L chart can help readers organize and retain those thoughts, thereby increasing their comprehension of the material.

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