Abstract: A method allows the better disambiguation and understanding of complex sentences by the mapping of syntactic elements to their thematic roles. The words and phrases form canonical sound patterns for comprehension which improves on basic reading strategies which rely on simple heuristics and pattern matches. The method can be taught by a live person or computer, self-taught via passive or active courseware in written or multimedia form, in an active or passive fashion, or via the Internet with real-time or non-real-time interactions, for training humans or computers.