Comprehension Builder is grounded in reading research. Its lessons address comprehension skills and strategies supported by research, and they incorporate instructional methods aligned with research-based teaching practices. Click here to view a document including the rationale for each lesson (citing supporting research) as well as brief lesson overviews. 

Formal effect size data for Comprehension Builder are not available. Unlike a highly standardized intervention designed to be delivered with strict fidelity, Comprehension Builder functions as a flexible instructional toolkit. It is intended to support teacher decision-making, allowing educators to select and apply components based on their students’ needs, instructional goals, and setting. Because its implementation is designed to vary intentionally across classrooms and learners, it is not as easily evaluated through a single, fixed model of use. Its value lies in giving teachers adaptable, research-aligned resources for comprehension instruction and practice rather than prescribing one uniform intervention sequence.

Comprehension Builder is a flexible toolkit designed to be adaptable for a variety of instructional settings. Each lesson and activity can be customized to fit the needs of your students, no matter their current reading level, or whether you're working with individual students, small groups, or a whole class. The lessons can provide targeted support for students who are struggling with reading comprehension, while also helping students who are meeting grade-level expectations strengthen, extend, and apply their skills.

Comprehension Builder was designed for learners of all ages working at beginning to intermediate skill levels. Most activities can be adapted for students in grades 1–8 (or students reading at those levels). Each lesson includes options to make the activities easier or more challenging for students, along with story text options at multiple levels.  

Each lesson includes multiple activities (an average of four, ranging from two to six), which are generally designed to take about 25–30 minutes. However, pacing may vary depending on instructional decisions, group size, reading level, and other factors. You may also adjust activities based on your available time by choosing to split them up or adding further discussion/practice opportunities.

Because Comprehension Builder is intentionally flexible, dosage is not fixed; the number of response opportunities and the amount of instructional time will depend on variables such as group size, session length, and the instructional decisions the teacher makes. Comprehension Builder is designed to maximize instructional time by giving students multiple opportunities to respond and receive feedback/support within each activity.

Comprehension Builder reflects a comprehensive approach to instruction by incorporating several key principles of explicit teaching. Each lesson includes direct explanation, teacher modeling, scaffolded support, gradual release of responsibility, collaborative learning, and frequent opportunities for student response. The program also offers substantial practice, extension opportunities, and differentiation options, enabling teachers to adjust instruction based on student readiness. Review the Before-Reading Strategies and Making Inferences lessons (included in the free sample) to see how these principles are applied.  

A validated, data-based process for assessing reading comprehension is inherently complex, because comprehension performance is shaped by many factors. A student’s understanding of a text, and their ability to demonstrate that understanding, may be affected by decoding ability, text difficulty, background knowledge, interest, attention, reading stamina, working memory, processing time, and other variables. For that reason, meaningful monitoring of progress in reading comprehension depends heavily on frequent teacher observation, formative assessment, and real-time instructional adjustment.  

Comprehension Builder was designed with this complexity in mind. Its flexible structure allows teachers to make systematic instructional adjustments in the moment and over time through lesson/activity selection, pacing, differentiation options, text selection, scaffolding, and more based on how students are performing.

Each Comprehension Builder lesson includes a Beyond the Lesson section that gives teachers ways to reinforce skills after completing the lesson and within other contexts. In addition, the Beyond Comprehension Builder: Strengthening Reading Comprehension Every Day section in the Introduction to Comprehension Builder (included in the free sample) provides several pages of practical suggestions for embedding reading comprehension instruction and practice throughout the year and across subject areas. These features support teachers in helping students make connections between newly learned skills, previously developed skills, and broader academic tasks. 

Many of the suggestions, strategies, and instructional options provided throughout the Comprehension Builder lessons reflect research-based practices that benefit a wide range of students—including multilingual learners, students with dyslexia and other reading disabilities, neurodivergent students, and students who need additional enrichment or acceleration. Further, each activity includes multiple differentiation options that can be selected based on individual student needs. 

Most lessons and activities in Comprehension Builder can be adapted for students working at primary to intermediate skill levels. Based on students’ needs, teachers may choose to teach the lessons sequentially, teach selected lessons separately, align them with topics in other programs, or use them as needed to address specific skill gaps. See the Instructional Options section in the Introduction to Comprehension Builder (included in the free sample) for more information.  

If you have limited information about your students, you may consider starting with the strategy lessons in Section 1 and then continuing sequentially. Another option is to identify and then begin with lessons/activities that most closely align with grade-level expectations, standards, or other instructional priorities. As you get to know students over time, you may choose to shift to a more needs-based instructional approach.

Before teaching a lesson, you will need to select practice text(s). Students will do best with text somewhat near their oral reading fluency level. You can use the Hasbrouck-Tindal table or the Read Naturally Placement Packet to guide you in conducting an oral reading fluency assessment. The Read Naturally Placement Packet also includes quizzes. If a student scores below 60% on the quiz, consider starting with an easier level of text when working in Comprehension Builder, even if their words-correct-per-minute score falls within the placement range. 

The selected text level does not need to be exact, as Comprehension Builder provides guidance for adjusting scaffolding based on students’ readiness. Activities begin with modeling and/or collaborative learning, so students can still find success when working at a challenging reading level. Additionally, based on a student’s performance during those earlier exercises in a lesson, you can select a different text difficulty for the independent or partner practice portions of the lesson. 

Comprehension Builder includes 18 practice stories with levels ranging from 1 to 7. Teachers may also choose to use outside texts of their choice. See the Selecting Which Stories to Use section in the Introduction to Comprehension Builder (included in the free sample) for more information. 

The Introduction to Comprehension Builder and the Before, During, and After-Reading lessons have been adapted for use with Read Live and can be found in the Student Activity page within the Teacher Module (click the Application-Specific Actions button in the top left corner of the page, then choose Comprehension Lessons from the Read Naturally Live dropdown menu). 

Comprehension Builder was not specifically designed for online use, but all resources are provided in a digital format on a USB drive, and most activity steps can be easily adapted for an online setting. Some exercises may require a bit of creativity. For example, there is a sequencing activity that has students cut out cards representing events from a story and arrange them in chronological order. In an online setting, you might instead create a digital version of the cards using your preferred online quiz platform, or simply have students type out or discuss the order of events.