Reading tutoring from literacy to comprehension

At the Chicago Home Tutor we use the most current research to improve your student’s reading – from early literacy skills to high level comprehension. We use a variety of strategies for reading instruction and will design an individualized program specifically for your student.

Before beginning reading instruction we always start with a thorough assessment to make our instruction targeted and efficient. This assessment includes early literacy skills (the building blocks of reading), fluency, and comprehension to help us determine exactly where your student needs extra help or enrichment. For more information on best practices in reading instruction and the different areas of reading, see the report by the National Reading Panel.

For our early readers we often incorporate the Sound Partners Curriculum. The Sound Partners Curriculum has been proven by independent studies in the Department of Education’s What Works Clearinghouse (see full report here) to on average improve alphabetics by 21 percentile points, fluency by 19 percentile points, and comprehension by 21 percentile points. 

We also utilize Orton-Gillingham which is a multi-sensory reading intervention that “incorporates the three learning pathways, which are: auditory, kinesthetic, and visual. This approach is beneficial not only for students with dyslexia, but for all learners. It can be implemented in a large group setting as well as with individuals, small groups and at-risk populations” (continue learning about Orton-Gillingham here).

For students who read accurately but struggle with fluency, we use the HELPS program, listening passage preview, repeated readings, and much more. Also, students who complete our Sound Partners program (described above) on average improve 19 percentile points in reading fluency.

We always embed comprehension instruction into our activities to ensure that students are understanding what they read and developing higher level literacy skills such as determining the main idea, summarizing, and making inferences. Some students need extra support in higher level literacy. For these students we provide direct instruction in reading comprehension using research-supported methods such as Click or Clunk, QAR, Advanced Story Maps,Reciprocal Teaching, and much more!