Showing papers in "Reading Research Quarterly in 1986"
TL;DR: A framework for conceptualizing the development of individual differences in reading ability is presented in this paper that synthesizes a great deal of the research literature and places special emphasis on reading ability.
Abstract: A framework for conceptualizing the development of individual differences in reading ability is presented that synthesizes a great deal of the research literature. The framework places special emph...
5,062Â citations
TL;DR: In this article, three studies were conducted to determine the extent to which context helps students infer the meanings of unknown words, and the conclusion is drawn that instructional strategies that prioritize context clues should be reexamined.
Abstract: THREE STUDIES were conducted to determine the extent to which context helps students infer the meanings of unknown words. In Experiment 1, students in Grades 10 and 11 were randomly assigned to either a context or a no-context condition. The no-context group read lowfrequency words in isolation. The context group read the same words embedded in passages taken from novels. Experiment 2 was a repeated-measures study in which 39 students in Grade 11 read sets of words in isolation and also in passages taken from four different content areas. Experiment 3 was a systematic replication of Experiment 1 in which subjects were required to write definitions for the low-frequency words instead of choosing the definitions in a multiple-choice format. In none of the three experiments was there any statistically significant effect due to the context: t(99) = .552, p > .10; F(1, 38) = .227, p > .10; and t(83) = -.29, p > .10, respectively. The conclusion is drawn that instructional strategies that prioritize context clues should be reexamined.
206Â citations
TL;DR: This article found that explicit teacher explanation of how reading skills can be used as strategies would result in increased student awareness of what was taught, which in turn would lead to increased reading achievement on standardized measures.
Abstract: PREVIOUS RESEARCH has established that good readers, in contrast to poor readers, are aware of how to use reading comprehension strategies, and that an adjunct curriculum in how to use such strategies can result in achievement gains. However, it is not known whether teachers can, as a part of the regular instructional program for students in low reading groups, develop awareness of how to be strategic and, as a result, improve learning outcomes. The experimental intervention study reported here trained classroom teachers to be explicit when teaching low reading groups to use reading skills strategically. Twenty-two teachers participated in the study. It was hypothesized that explicit teacher explanation of how reading skills can be used as strategies would result in increased student awareness of what was taught, which in turn would lead to increased reading achievement on standardized measures. Results suggested that the treatment teachers learned to be more explicit in teaching reading skills, and that this explicitness resulted in significantly greater student awareness of what was taught. However, no significant achievement gains were found. Due to its methodological complexity, the study has implications for future research in naturalistic settings.
194Â citations
TL;DR: The authors compared two experimental methods of instructing sixth-grade students to use the organization of ideas in content reading as a framework for studying (mapconstruction and map-study procedures) with two control study methods which did not focus students' attention on text organization (question answering and rereading).
Abstract: THIS INVESTIGATION compared two experimental methods of instructing sixth-grade students to use the organization of ideas in content reading as a framework for studying (mapconstruction and map-study procedures) with two control study methods which did not focus students' attention on text organization (question-answering and rereading procedures). After a 6-week instructional program, students who used map-construction scored significantly higher on immediate free recall for one of two expository passages than students who used the other study procedures. When only students who were judged to be expert at either constructing maps or answering questions were considered, map-construction fostered significantly greater free recall than question-answering under immediate and delayed recall conditions. No effects were found in favor of the map-study procedure. The results suggest that students in middle-grade classrooms would benefit from instruction and practice in map-construction.
163Â citations
TL;DR: The authors reported the direct and indirect effects of a summarization training program on the reading and studying skills of 70 sixth-grade students and found that the training improved recall of major but not minor information on a studying task.
Abstract: THE STUDY reports the direct and indirect effects of a summarization training program on the reading and studying skills of 70 sixth-grade students. The training improved recall of major but not minor information on a studying task. Path analyses showed that the summarization training affected recall of major information indirectly, through its effect on the amount of major information in students' notes, confirming a metacognitive hypothesis. The training also improved summaries of paragraphs that had main ideas stated within the paragraphs, but not those in which the statement of main ideas had to be invented. These results indicate that
158Â citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a study was conducted to determine whether children's voluntary use of library centers and their attitudes toward reading could be positively affected by involvement in a literature program emphasizing the enjoyment of books.
Abstract: THE PURPOSE of this study was to determine whether children's voluntary use of library centers and their attitudes toward reading could be positively affected by involvement in a literature program emphasizing the enjoyment of books. Six second-grade classes were assigned to one control group and two experimental groups-a group in a school-based program and a group in a schooland home-based program. Questionnaires and observations were used to assess students' attitudes and behaviors before, during, and after involvement in the program. Voluntary use of the library center during free-choice time in school significantly increased in both experimental groups. Moreover, this effect continued after the intervention had ended. Girls engaged in library center activities significantly more than boys and were more responsive to the intervention. However, achievement level was unrelated to library center use or to responsiveness. The intervention had no effect on students' attitudes toward reading nor on reading habits at home. Because the results of a parent questionnaire suggest that parents did not fully implement the home-based program, increases in use of the library center in both experimental groups can be attributed to the school-based intervention.
137Â citations
TL;DR: This paper investigated the effects of mental imagery on the comprehension performance of poor readers and found that subjects who received instructions to induce mental imagery identified both explicit and implicit inconsistencies in text significantly more often than did the subjects in the control group.
Abstract: THE PURPOSE of this study was to investigate the effects of mental imagery upon the comprehension-monitoring performance of poor readers. Sixty-two fourth-grade and 62 fifth-grade poor readers were randomly assigned to two treatments: imagery instructions or general instructions. Subjects read two passages, one containing an explicit inconsistency and one containing an implicit inconsistency. Following silent reading of each passage, the subjects responded to a 10-item instrument designed to elicit information concerning their awareness of the inconsistency embedded in the text. The subjects who received instructions to induce mental imagery identified both explicit and implicit inconsistencies in text significantly more often than did the subjects in the control group. The results are interpreted as support of the use of mental imagery as a comprehension-monitoring strategy.
129Â citations
TL;DR: This article found that reading ability in third-and fifth-grade children was most strongly related to vocabulary and word recognition speed, whereas the strongest predictors of reading ability were vocabulary and decoding skill.
Abstract: GROUPS OF thirdand fifth-grade children were administered tasks assessing receptive vocabulary, phonological awareness, general name-retrieval ability, decoding skill, wordrecognition speed, and the ability to use context to speed word recognition. All of the tasks were significantly related to reading achievement except name retrieval in the third-grade sample. Reading ability in the third-grade children was most strongly related to vocabulary and word-recognition speed, whereas the strongest predictors of reading ability in the fifthgrade sample were vocabulary and decoding skill. The skilled third-grade readers and less skilled fifth-grade readers were approximately matched on overall reading level, providing an opportunity to test a developmental lag model of individual differences in reading skill. The cognitive profiles of these two groups were very similar. Although the traditional domain of developmental lag models has been dyslexia (i.e., severe reading disability), it is argued that this type of model is actually more helpful as an aid to understanding the normal achievement variations observed among nondyslexic children.
126Â citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the development of grammatical sensitivity across Grades 1, 2, and 3 on a variety of oral-language tasks and related this development to the acquisition of skill in reading, as reflected by a range of reading measures.
Abstract: THIS RESEARCH traced the development of grammatical sensitivity (both semantic and syntactic) across Grades 1, 2, and 3 on a variety of oral-language tasks and related this development to the acquisition of skill in reading, as reflected by a range of reading measures. The results provide clear evidence for the development of grammatical sensitivity across the three grades, and grammatical sensitivity (with general cognitive ability and vocabulary level controlled) was found to be significantly related to level of reading skill. The findings are interpreted within the context of interactive-compensatory processes in reading fluency and stages of reading acquisition.
110Â citations
TL;DR: In this article, the effects of preteaching vocabulary of differing levels of importance to a text using two different methods of instruction on children's comprehension of basal stories were evaluated. But the results of the instructional method treatment were unclear due to interactions with story.
Abstract: THE PURPOSE of this research was to determine the effects of preteaching vocabulary of differing levels of importance to a text using two different methods of instruction on children's comprehension of basal stories. One hundred and twenty average and above-average fifthgrade readers participated in two group sessions. During the first session, small groups of subjects received a vocabulary lesson on one set of five words (central or noncentral), using one of two methods of instruction (dictionary or concept) for one of two stories. Twenty-four hours later the second session was held, and two comprehension measures (recall and questions) and two vocabulary measures (definition and example) were administered. The results of the word-level treatment indicated that preteaching unfamiliar vocabulary enhanced children's comprehension of story ideas that were related to the instructed vocabulary regardless of level of importance. The results of the instructional method treatment were unclear due to interactions with story. The results also suggested that comprehension questions designed to evaluate students' understanding of story ideas that were related to the instructed vocabulary provided a more sensitive measure of children's comprehension than a general recall measure.
70Â citations
TL;DR: The results indicate that young children, even those from homes where exposure to a literate environment is not likely to occur, can develop important pre-literacy skills when the right environment is provided in the classroom.
Abstract: THIS ARTICLE reports the results of a program designed to train teachers to implement a theory-based pre-reading curriculum. The study focuses on the degree to which teachers were able to implement such a program, the observable factors which characterized implementing classrooms, and the effects of implementation on the reading-related achievement of kindergarten children. The study was carried out in conjunction with a Right-to-Read grant from the U.S. Office of Education. Subjects for the effects-of-implementation analysis were 124 kindergarten students from four implementing and two nonimplementing classrooms. The results indicate that young children, even those from homes where exposure to a literate environment is not likely to occur, can develop important pre-literacy skills when the right environment is provided in the classroom. The results further indicate that children learn best in a language- and print-rich environment, characterized by many opportunities to observe, try out, and practice literacy skills in genuine communicative situations.
TL;DR: In this article, the effects of repeated reading of to-be-learned material on recall and retention, as well as persistence of errors over time, were examined, and both quantitative and qualitative differences in recall were found as a function of the number of times text was read.
Abstract: SIXTY GRADUATE STUDENTS instructed to read a 669-word expository passage one, two, or three times completed both free and cued recall measures on three test occasions. Effects of repeated reading of to-be-learned material on recall and retention, as well as persistence of errors over time, were examined. Both quantitative and qualitative differences in recall were found as a function of the number of times text was read. Subjects who read the passage twice prior to first recall remembered significantly more text information than subjects reading the passage one or three times. Subjects who read the passage three times exhibited disproportionate recall of details versus main ideas. Persistence of initial encoding errors was remarkably stable for all groups despite the fact that all subjects reread the passage after the first recall. As expected, errors on the first cued recall were more likely to be repeated on a delayed recall, once they had been repeated on an immediate retest.
TL;DR: The authors examined how fourth and fifth-grade students wrote summaries of both expository and narrative prose and to see where the process was breaking down, concluding that inability to find and express the main idea in both rhetorical modes was the chief deficiency in the students' work.
Abstract: THE PURPOSE of this study was to examine how fourthand fifth-grade students wrote summaries of both expository and narrative prose and to see where the process was breaking down. In the first investigation, protocol analysis was used individually with 17 children; in the second, 52 subjects were examined in a group setting. Some of the principal findings were that these subjects had no more difficulty summarizing expository than narrative prose, that performance on a standardized reading test did not predict accurately their ability to find and state the main idea in their written summaries, that their written responses were somewhat vague for a general audience to understand, and that no more than 25 % of the subjects could find and explain the moral in the narrative. In fact, inability to find and express the main idea in both rhetorical modes was judged to be the chief deficiency in the students' work. They had a rather superficial understanding of the difference between expository and narrative prose, and exhibited few skills in notetaking or text marking. The article includes a list of eight qualities possessed by the successful summarizers.
TL;DR: This article found that students in the mnemonic imagery condition recall more name/accomplishment information than did controls, while no-strategy control students were left to their own devices.
Abstract: JUNIOR HIGH school students representing aboveand below-average reading levels read several passages about the accomplishments of famous people. Students in the mnemonic imagery condition were taught a systematic strategy to apply to the passages they read, whereas no-strategy control students were left to their own devices. Consistent with previous findings, mnemonic imagery students remembered more name/accomplishment information than did controls. Mnemonic benefits were obtained by both aboveand below-average readers on short fictional passages (Experiment 1), as well as on longer nonfictional passages taken from actual school reading materials (Exp. 2). Implications of the results and suggestions for future research are included in the discussion.
TL;DR: The authors examined commonality and variation in reader response to a short story and found that students who empathized with a particular character identified the conflict as pertaining to that character, and found significant relationships between response categories.
Abstract: THE PURPOSE of this study was to examine commonality and variation in reader response to a short story. Sixty-three ninth-grade students read a short story and selected preferred responses in four categories: reader beliefs, reader empathy, text events, and text conflict. An analysis of frequency patterns indicated a high degree of agreement on reader beliefs and text events. Variation in response occurred in the categories of reader empathy and text conflict. A chi-square analysis indicated significant relationships between response categories. One notable finding was that students who empathized with a particular character identified the conflict as pertaining to that character. The findings suggest specific reader-based and text-based factors which produce convergence and divergence in reader response. These results indicate the importance of examining the relationship between empathy and interpretation of theme in future studies.
TL;DR: The authors analyzed the types of writing included in each program from pre-primers to sixth-grade readers and to determine the array of writing types in three standardized reading tests and assessment tests which are included in the basal programs.
Abstract: EIGHT LEADING basal reading programs were analyzed to determine the types of writing included in each program from preprimers to sixth-grade readers and to determine the array of writing types in three standardized reading tests and assessment tests which are included in the basal programs. Teachers' manuals were also examined to determine whether provision was included for teaching children how to read a wide variety of writing types. The preponderance of selections in all of the readers was narrative (41 %); poems accounted for 24% of the total selections, and exposition accounted for 16%. A second measure examining page allocation indicated narrative writings accounted for more than 66% of the total pages. Two discrepancies between reading programs and standardized tests were noted: (1) Few whole texts were included in tests before the end of the second grade, and (2) most test passages were either narrative or expository; poetry and plays were not assessed.
TL;DR: The authors used a story grammar to create improved versions of stories that would be comprehended and recalled better than the original basal stories, using both free response and probes tapping implicit and explicit information from the passage.
Abstract: THE PURPOSE of this study was to determine whether a story grammar could be used to create improved versions of stories that would be comprehended and recalled better than the original basal stories. Thirty-two second-grade children were asked to read orally a basal passage that did not adhere to the prose organizational rules delineated in a story grammar and a wellformed story developed from a second basal passage. Readability of the passages was controlled so that the two revised versions were only slightly more difficult than the two original versions. Recall was tested using both free response and probes tapping implicit and explicit information from the passage. Subjects who read the well-formed versions recalled significantly more of the explicit (although not the implicit) information, recalled it more often in correct sequence, and recalled less text-erroneous information. These results indicate the importance of providing children with reading selections that conform to their expectations for well-structured stories.
TL;DR: The authors investigated the effectiveness of a direct instruction model for teaching children to comprehend anaphoric relationships and found that students in the strategy group consistently outperformed students in both the basal group and the control group.
Abstract: THIS STUDY investigated the effectiveness of a direct instruction model for teaching children to comprehend anaphoric relationships Fifty-nine third-grade children were assigned randomly to one of three treatments: a strategy group, in which subjects received intensive, systematic instruction in anaphora resolution according to a direct instruction model; a basal group, in which subjects were administered a series of lessons on word referents from a current basal reader program; and a control group, in which subjects received no added instruction on anaphora and simply participated in normal classroom language arts instruction Several immediate and delayed posttests revealed that students in the strategy group consistently outperformed students in both the basal group and the control group in ability (a) to find the antecedent for the anaphoric term in short, contrived passages, (b) to find the antecedent for the anaphoric term in longer, more ecologically valid narrative and expository passages selected from basal readers, and (c) to answer anaphora-specific wh questions about narrative and expository selections in basal readers These results were interpreted as further support for the efficacy of a direct instructional model for teaching children reading comprehension skills
TL;DR: This article examined the development of young readers' use of this context in two experiments and found that with reading experience, children identify the systematic relationship between pronunciation and orthographic structure and utilize that knowledge in the pronunciation of unfamiliar words.
Abstract: TO DISAMBIGUATE vowel assignment to a vowel digraph in a word, readers must take into account aspects of the word context beyond the vowel digraph units themselves. The present study examined the development of young readers' use of this context in two experiments. First-, third-, and fifth-grade children read aloud highand low-frequency words containing vowel digraph units with variant and invariant pronunciations (Experiment 1); the third-grade children also read pseudowords containing vowel digraph units with variant pronunciations (Experiment 2). Words and pseudowords containing vowel digraph units with variant pronunciations were further categorized by the uniformity of pronunciation of the vowel digraphfinal consonant unit as it appeared in real words (i.e., the orthographic neighborhood consistency). Word reading accuracy of all groups was affected by word frequency and variation in the pronunciation of the vowel digraph unit; however, only the thirdand fifth-grade children demonstrated sensitivity to orthographic neighborhood consistency. With the pseudowords, the influence of the vowel digraph-final consonant unit in determining pronunciation was again indicated. The findings from both experiments support the hypothesis that with reading experience, children identify the systematic relationship between pronunciation and orthographic structure and utilize that knowledge in the pronunciation of unfamiliar words.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors focus on the use of the thematic organizer as a strategy that aids students' ability to impose their own structure on a text to facilitate comprehension and recall.
Abstract: readers. Materials included social studies passages, directions for retelling, and literal and inferential questions. The results of both experiments favor the use of the thematic organizer to increase performance on several measures of literal and inferential comprehension. The findings indicate that the thematic strategy facilitated more complete recall of text ideas and the ability to elaborate upon implied information. The discussion focuses on the use of the thematic organizer as a strategy that aids students' ability to impose their own structure on a text to facilitate comprehension and recall.
TL;DR: This paper investigated the span of letter recognition for good and poor readers during a reading task and found that skilled readers utilize letter information from a wider region of text than do less able readers.
Abstract: THIS STUDY investigated the span of letter recognition for good and poor readers during a reading task Sixteen fifth-grade children read passages from a cathode-ray tube as their eye movements were monitored On selected fixations during reading, letters in certain regions of the display were replaced by other letters This manipulation provided erroneous text in specific regions of the visual field The results of the study indicate that both groups acquire letter information from a region of text extending from two letters to the left of the center of the fixation through to about six or seven letters to the right There was no evidence to suggest that skilled readers utilize letter information from a wider region of text than do less able readers The findings have significant implications for theories of information processing and theories of eye guidance in reading, especially as the present investigation is the first to compare the performance of good and poor readers when peripheral information is disrupted but foveal information remains intact
TL;DR: This paper examined the relation between oral and silent reading comprehension in an information-processing framework and found that memory traces of text microstructure created in (slower) oral reading are accessed faster during memory-based comprehension tasks than traces established by faster processes that occur during silent reading.
Abstract: THE RELATION between oral and silent reading comprehension was examined in an information-processing framework. In this framework, comprehension involves construction of and access to a hierarchical knowledge structure by the reader. Reading rates and comprehension measures that probed recognition of various levels of text structure were collected for passages read orally and silently by 16 college students. Oral reading rates were slower than silent reading rates. More encompassing or higher level representations were verified more slowly than lexical and lower level text representations. Differences due to reading mode were found only for lowand high-level propositions that occurred in the text explicitly; for these, silent reading of the text led to slower verification responses than oral reading. The results suggest that memory traces of text microstructure created in (slower) oral reading are accessed faster during memory-based comprehension tasks than traces established by faster processes that occur during silent reading.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors describe teachers' and administrators' thoughts concerning reading and reading instruction within the context of a reading program which combines merit pay and other business practices to increase students' standardized test scores.
Abstract: THE STUDY describes teachers' and administrators' thoughts concerning reading and reading instruction within the context of a reading program which combines merit pay and other business practices to increase students' standardized test scores. Questionnaires, interviews, observation, and district publications were used to investigate two theoretical consequences of such programs: that school personnel would constrict their definitions of reading and reading instruction to those prescribed by district policy, and that teachers would consider reading instruction less fulfilling than they did prior to the merit pay program. Results supported these predictions and suggest that attempts to change teacher behavior from current practice may meet with failure.
TL;DR: This paper found that reading-disabled children are as good as normal readers at integrating visual and aural input, and the increase in sight vocabulary in reading-disabled children is not accompanied by a concomitant increase in their knowledge of orthographic structure.
Abstract: TEN READING-DISABLED children and 20 normal readers were asked to judge which of two stimuli was "more like a real word." Sixty pairs of four-letter strings were presented in three conditions: visual, aural, and bimodal. The letter strings were either real words, orthographically correct pseudowords, orthographically incorrect pseudowords, or embedded words. Each reading-disabled child was compared with two normal readers: one matched for age, and one matched for reading level. The results indicate that (a) embedded words are quite salient for beginning readers, (b) knowledge of orthographic structure is positively related to reading ability, (c) reading-disabled children are as good as normal readers at integrating visual and aural input, and (d) the increase in sight vocabulary in reading-disabled children is not accompanied by a concomitant increase in their knowledge of orthographic structure. The latter suggests that reading-disabled children are not simply developmentally delayed.
Journal Article•
TL;DR: This paper examined reports published in the Reading Research Quarterly from 1980 through 1985 and found that only about one quarter focus on reading instruction, and about eighty percent of these are experimental in design and compare the results of alternative teaching approaches.
Abstract: How can we best contribute to the development of a body of knowledge that will inform the practice of classroom reading instruction? An examination of reports published in the Reading Research Quarterly from 1980 through 1985 shows that only about one quarter focus on reading instruction, and about eighty percent of these are experimental in design and compare the results of alternative teaching approaches. Earlier research into the cognitive processes of reading forms the basis for many of these instructional studies. The experimental design in which some form of intervention occurs does
TL;DR: This article examined children's ability to understand the use of deictic terms in oral and written language, and found that children found it more difficult to interpret deictive terms when they were observers rather than participants in a conversation.
Abstract: THIS STUDY examined children's ability to understand the use of deictic terms in oral and written language. Three categories of words with deictic content were investigated: pronouns (e.g., I, you), locatives (e.g., this, here), and motion verbs (e.g., come, go). Three groups of second-grade students performed three types of tasks: oral-language tasks, written-language tasks, and picture-selection tasks. Planned comparisons indicated that written-language tasks were more difficult than comparable oral-language tasks, that motion verbs were more difficult for children to interpret, and that children found it more difficult to interpret deictic terms when they were observers than when they were participants in a conversation. Children had as much difficulty interpreting deictic terms in written texts addressed to the reader as in written texts representing quoted dialogue. Factors that contributed to the difficulty children had in interpreting words with deictic content are discussed.
TL;DR: In this paper, a large number of fourth-grade students from two elementary schools were randomly assigned to one of three commercially-prepared informal reading inventories: Analytical, Basic, and Ekwall.
Abstract: SEVENTY-FIVE fourth-grade students from two elementary schools were randomly assigned to one of three commercially-prepared informal reading inventories. Forms A and B of the Analytical, Basic, and Ekwall reading inventories were administered to these three groups. Pearson and generalizability coefficients ranged between .60 and .78. According to estimated variance components from the generalizability analysis, little error could be directly attributed to the forms, as the subjects were the source of the greatest variance. Although the results of the study did not reveal perfect reliability, they were by no means as unreliable as some critics have suggested. Future research is needed to address the question of what an acceptable level of reliability would be for informal reading inventories.