Comprehension Cloze In Primary 4: Effective Strategies For Students To Tackle This Component

Comprehension Cloze is one of the more challenging components for the PSLE. Students officially begin tackling this component in their P5 year in schools. Despite starting a year before the P6 year, why do students still struggle with Comprehension Cloze?

What does the Comprehension Cloze consist of?

It is usually an extract taken from a non-fiction source. The extract or the passage can come from a magazine such as The Readers Digest or a book such as Chicken Soup for the Soul. More often than not, the passage comes from a newspaper article such as Straits Times.

The setter (the person setting the examination) will remove 15 words from the passage. These words can be verbs, nouns, pronouns, relative pronouns, adjectives, etc. It would be good if students can identify the type of word that they need to fill in the blank with.

While setting the Comprehension Cloze passage, the setter will also look out for contextual clues that can help a student find the word to fill in. Contextual clues are clues found in the passage that can help the student. Some clues are straightforward and very easy to spot. Others may take a longer time to look for. Nevertheless, a student who is able to spot clues has half the battle won when doing Comprehension Cloze.

If P5 and P6 students struggle in Comprehension Cloze, should we start training them earlier?

While the P4 year is the year when students build a strong grammatical base for the upper primary years, we at TF decided to introduce to our P4 students weekly Comprehension Cloze and Synthesis & Transformation in an Extra monthly booklet.

However, we begin our Comprehension Cloze passages at a level that students can succeed in. We want them to build their confidence that they can tackle the Comprehension Cloze passages. Later, we will mirror our passages to that of P5 Comprehension Cloze.

TF’s passages are based on themes that our P4 students can relate to. For example, going to the zoo or being at the beach. For the first two months, they will tackle 5-8 blanks. Our aim is for them to learn the proper techniques in looking for contextual clues and understand the type of word to fill in the blank. When we feel that they have understood this, we will increase the number of blanks and the difficulty of the passages.

We want our P4 students to master the techniques of how to handle Comprehension Cloze by the end of their Primary 4 year before progressing to their P5 year.

Comprehension Cloze Exercise

Below is an example of a beginner’s Comprehension Cloze passage we used this month :

Last Saturday, my family and I went to the beach for a fun day out. The sun was shining  (1) _______________ the sky was a beautiful shade of blue. We packed our bags with towels, snacks, and a large bottle of (2) _______________ to stay hydrated. When we arrived, the sound of the waves crashing against the shore made me feel (3) _______________. My brother and I built a huge sandcastle near the water. We decorated it with shells and  (4)_______________ sticks for flags. As we worked, a cool breeze blew gently, making the hot day more (5) _______________. After that, we ran into the sea to splash and play. The water was cool and refreshing.   Let us take a look at the contextual clues found in the passage.

From here, let us identify the type of word and answer to fill in the blank.

1. Conjunction – and
2. Noun – water
3. Adjective – relaxed, calm
4. Adjective – small / wooden
5. Adjective – comfortable / cooling

Passages like these are relatively easy to create at home for your child to practise. We hope that this post has helped P4 students understand the ways to tackle the Comprehension Cloze passage.