How does the explicit teaching of reading strategies to middle level students impact their reading comprehension?

Reading researchers discovered that the skill and drill routine of teaching reading does little for developing understanding, and in turn, studied what it is proficient readers do to comprehend. They found that proficient readers employ seven to eight different strategies, or mental processes, to gain meaning from text. These mental processes are known as metacognition. Metacognition is when the reader reflects upon and thinks about his thinking. Metacognitive readers utilize strategies that allow them to comprehend at a deeper level. Through research, I found the most commonly taught strategies were predicting, questioning, visualizing and applying the other senses, inferring, and making connections. I believed my middle level students lacked these strategies in their own reading, and focused instruction on them through modeling my comprehension thought processes through reading and thinking aloud