The Science of Reading: Verbal Reasoning - What EdLeaders Need to Know

August 09, 2022

The Science of Reading: Verbal Reasoning - What EdLeaders Need to Know

As I continue to unravel Dr. Hollis Scarborough's Reading Rope in an effort to understand what EdLeaders need to know when it comes to Reading Comprehension through the lens of the Science of Reading, I am grateful for the feedback I have received across platforms. I welcome and invite your comments here or through social media.

In the first blog post of this series, I spent time introducing the Science of Reading. If you have not read that post or listened to the corresponding episode on the EdLeader podcast, I would like to encourage you to spend a few moments with it as it grounds the series and undergirds the deconstruction of Reading Comprehension that I am attempting.

Previous blog posts in this series have focused on the strands of fluency, background knowledge, and sight word recognition.

In this blog post, I am pulling out the strand of verbal reasoning. Verbal reasoning was one of my favorite skills to teach in my classroom.

Before focusing on this blog post’s topic, please let me again highlight the foundation for this series.

The Science of Reading is undergirded by theories of how students learn to read and comprehend text. At the very basic level is the Simple View of Reading Theory which states that there are two elements that combine to result in Reading Comprehension. The Simple View of Reading formula states:

Decoding x Language Comprehension = Reading Comprehension

From this grew Scarborough's Reading Rope as conceived by Dr. Hollis S. Scarborough. Dr. Scarborough believed that the elements of Word Recognition and the elements of Language Comprehension all weave together into the rope of Reading Comprehension. Just like a true rope, the more strands present and the stronger each strand is, the stronger the rope is. It is surmised that if a student is weaker in one strand, the strength of the other strands can still help the student comprehend what she is reading.

The strands of Word Recognition include Decoding, Phonological Awareness, and Sight Word Recognition.

The strands of Language Comprehension include background knowledge, vocabulary, language structures, verbal reasoning, and literacy knowledge.

In this series, my goal is to peel apart the individual strands of reading comprehension and build our shared understanding of what EdLeaders need to know about learning to read.

So metaphorically, we grab Scarborough’s reading rope and separate the strands of Word Recognition and Language Comprehension. Within the Language Comprehension strands, we find the strand of verbal reasoning.

Verbal reasoning involves thinking about text, solving word problems, following written instructions to come up with a solution, spotting letter sequences, and cracking letter- and number-based codes. Verbal reasoning assessments measure a child’s ability to problem-solve and reason using words. These assessments are more a test of skill than of testing acquired knowledge.

Imagine that you decide to return to college and pursue a graduate degree. Chances are the university will require you to take the GRE or Graduate Record Examination. Because you are a great student and want to be as prepared as possible, you look up the tested elements of the GRE and there you see the Verbal Reasoning Measure. ETS, the Educational Testing Service, says this about the Verbal Reasoning Measure, “The Verbal Reasoning measure of the GRE General Test assesses your ability to analyze and evaluate written material and synthesize information obtained from it, analyze relationships among component parts of sentences and recognize relationships among words and concepts.” You may be asked, “to read, interpret and complete existing sentences, groups of sentences or paragraphs.”

A skill that is so important it is tested for entry into Graduate Degree Programs must be worthwhile and worth diving into.

Stephen McConkey, a retired Head Teacher and author from Belfast describes verbal reasoning as “in a nutshell, thinking with words. ‘As the name suggests,’ he says, ‘it’s a form of problem-solving based around words and language.’”

An example would be asking students to look at a list of words that include:

car - truck - van - doughnut - tractor - butterfly

and then asking the students to pick out the words that do not belong with the others. In this example, students would recognize that car, truck, van, and tractor belong together because they have wheels and are vehicles. Doughnut and butterfly clearly do not belong to that grouping. This example of verbal reasoning is problem-solving using words.

Another example would be asking students to look at the word ‘together’ and point out all of the words they can find hidden in the word. In the word ‘together,’ I see the words “to, get, her, and the.”

“The main principle is to test [a student’s] ability to solve problems based on written instructions.” (theschoolrun.com)

Students tend to do well in verbal reasoning if they have strengths in two other Language Comprehension strands, background knowledge, and vocabulary. As Mr. McConkey says, “‘A good general knowledge is also needed for verbal reasoning tests… Even if your child understands the question and can follow the written directions, if one of the possible words in the answer is unfamiliar, they may trip up.”

Verbal Reasoning skills help students develop qualities such as perception, understanding and solving complicated subject questions, empathy, and logical reasoning as well as ensuring they have a great vocabulary.

Verbal Reasoning pushes students to think closely about words. It involves:

problem-solving around words

thinking about text

following written instructions and deciphering a solution

understanding letter sequences, and

decoding letter and number-based codes

R.I.S.E. Arkansas is the Reading Initiative for Student Excellence from the Arkansas Department of Education. Developed in response to reading legislation in the state. The first of the three goals of the initiative is to “sharpen instruction and strengthen instruction." R.I.S.E. Arkansas provides a wealth of Science of Reading resources on its website.

The Arkansas Department of Education defines Verbal reasoning as “the ability to understand what you read or hear. It includes drawing conclusions from limited information and developing an understanding of how new ideas connect to what you already know.”

According to Evelyn Reiss, with the Great Word House Institute for Orton-Gillingham Educators, “Reading is not restricted to merely decoding and comprehending the words on a page. More often than not, just as in spoken language, the reader must look beyond the words to infer meaning from what is being said, what is not being said, and how it is being said (or not said). A reader must be able to grasp when words are being used literally or figuratively. For instance, a reader must use verbal reasoning skills to understand that “the supermarket was a zoo” likely means that the supermarket was like a zoo because it was noisy, chaotic, and crowded and not that it actually was a zoo. In a similar vein, we often use words as part of an idiomatic phrase; you may be familiar with the Amelia Bedelia children’s books and her infamous literal interpretations of commands given to her (dressing the turkey, drawing the curtains…). By talking with your child about the meaning of words, phrases, tones of voice, and even body language, and about what they are observing in the world, (current events, social interactions, books you are reading together, etc) you are helping your child develop and practice their verbal reasoning skills.”

As you consider the Verbal Reasoning strand of Scarborough’s Rope, perhaps a quick shorthand for what it is to simply think of it by two well-known examples of verbal reasoning, inference, and metaphor. Both require a reader to think beyond the words they are reading to truly understand the meaning the author is attempting to convey.

You may recall that I referenced Dr. Timothy Shanahan in the EdLeader Science of Reading blog post on sight word recognition. He has stated, “Students should be taught reading strategies as part of their reading comprehension instruction. But those strategies need to be more purposeful and dynamic than is often envisioned. We need to promote a desire to understand. The fundamental basis of successful strategy use needs to be an acceptance of the premise that we are trying to know the information in the texts that we read, and that such understanding will not always come easily. When that is the case, we need to make an effort to accomplish it.

With some texts, reading and thinking about the information may be all that is needed. In other cases, we have to try to solve the problems. Those problems may be linguistic (e.g., breaking down a sentence, looking up a definition), organizational (e.g., trying to use the author’s plan to connect ideas appropriate), or conceptual (e.g., connecting the ideas with prior knowledge) so we need to be flexible and responsive.”

Verbal reasoning is the ability to understand what you read or hear. It enables readers to draw conclusions from limited information and understand how new ideas connect to what the student already knows. It is truly a skill that is used in daily life.

Isa Marrs, a Speech Pathologist and Executive Director of the “Where I Can Be Me” program in New York says, “Verbal reasoning can be defined as the ability to understand and reason using words. This skill enables us to use our language skills in order to negotiate and explain within our environment. Think about our day-to-day lives as adults. We are constantly asked to explain our reasons for doing something. It may be while making a return at a store, hiring a handyman to help in our home, dealing with a discrepancy on a restaurant bill, or even a discussion with a friend or family member. Our ability to understand the possible outcomes and then use our language in order to negotiate our way to the one that is preferred is not only a life skill; it is also a skill that sets us apart from other species.”

Let’s pause for just a moment. The Executive Director of a highly successful program that helps students develop and build upon social skills like making friends and maintaining relationships is promoting the teaching of verbal reasoning as a life skill, beyond being an important component of teaching reading comprehension. In working with children, she says that she is “looking for their ability to comprehend the words, infer the message, and then use their language in order to navigate the situation.”

“Verbal reasoning involves listening and reading. Demonstrating verbal reasoning requires speaking and writing. Verbal reasoning -- one of four basic cognitive reasoning skills -- encompasses almost all learning tasks considered part of formal education. Even mathematics, which is a nonverbal skill, requires some verbal reasoning because it's generally taught through oral or written instruction. When most people discuss learning, they're talking about the ability to use verbal reasoning skills.” (Catherine Donges)

When children first begin to ask their parents what I think might be the most-used question of childhood, “Why?,” they are using and growing their verbal reasoning skills, skills that will be taught from elementary school through college and assessed on the SAT and GRE.

“To help students grow in their verbal reasoning abilities, teachers may wish to consider the following instructional activities:

Playing word games and quizzes, for example, spotting the odd one out from a list of words, giving a synonym or antonym for a word, and solving anagrams.
Encourage students to do crosswords and word searches, and play games like Hangman.
Play word-based family games like Scrabble and Boggle.
Set your child spelling challenges, focusing particularly on commonly misspelled words (there/their/they’re) and homophones (words that sound the same but are spelled differently, like fair and fare).
Take students to museums, shows, and exhibitions to build their general knowledge.” (posted on theschoolrun.com)

Verbal Reasoning is clearly an important skill and I certainly understand why Dr. Scarborough listed it as a separate strand in her reading rope.