The purpose of this study was to analyze and compare the oral reading strategies of average and below-average readers in grades four, five, and six who were speakers of Hawaiian Islands dialect. Fifty subjects from Keaukaha School on the island of Hawaii composed the sample group. Subjects were selected on the basis of their standardized test scores and their dialect proficiency as measured by the Hawaiian Islands Dialect Proficiency Assessment. The standard procedures of the Reading Miscue Inventory were employed in the analysis of oral reading miscues and the evaluation of transcripts of story retelling. As a group, fourth graders relied more heavily on graphophonic cues in their decoding strategies than did fifth or sixth graders. Sixth graders proved more adept at applying semantic cues in their decoding strategies than did fourth or fifth graders. Across grades, average readers made greater use of syntactic and semantic information than their below-average peers. In general, dialect miscues were mainly phonological in nature and did not interfere with meaning, and subjects showed a greater degree of dialect usage in their retellings of the selections read than in their original readings. (Author/KS)