Purpose: In this article, we respond to Catts and Kamhi's (2017) argument that reading comprehension is not a single ability. Method: We provide a brief review of the impact of strategy instruction, the importance of knowledge in reading comprehension, and possible avenues for future research and practice. Results: We agree with Catts and Kamhi's…

Discusses the challenge of answering questions and suggests how teachers can help students learn how to answer questions as they learn to read. (PRA)

The relation of reading comprehension and information retention is discussed with emphasis on teaching methods and learning activities. (DS)

This paper examines the uniqueness of poetry and classroom methodology as found in children's experiences of hearing, enacting, discussing, and making poems. Poetry offers the peculiar use of language, form, and a fresh look. Poems are useful in the classroom as they are read differently from ordinary text, are read with both the eye and the ear,…

Many consider the use of adjunct questions (mathemagenics) to be a means by which the instructional value of a text can be increased with relatively little difficulty, and this explains the appeal they have generated over the years. Yet this appeal is seldom tempered by a consideration of the ecological validity of the experimental studies on…

This article examines classroom organizational patterns and the focus, content, and strategies of instruction to show that the basal reader, rather than reading comprehension, is what is being taught. A skills model of reading, the basal approach, does not reflect what readers do to make sense of text. (IAH)

This paper argues that the ability to rapidly compare phonemes is a primary sensory-cognitive function underlying self-correction in word recognition and spelling and thus, indirectly, reading comprehension. Such phonological defects can be addressed both preventively and remedially using procedures that are fundamentally different from typical…

It is argued that the close relationship between learning and testing is best exemplified in achievement tests, which are designed both to reinforce learning and to provide feedback about the effectiveness of teaching. Of the four types of achievement tests (placement, formative, diagnostic, and summative), two (formative and diagnostic) are…

Argues that picture books pose difficulties for young children who are not yet equipped to interpret them. (AEW)

Defining reading as a constructive process involving an interaction of the reader, the text, and the context, this paper offers a model of student cognitive processing that incorporates research in reading, thinking, teaching, and instructional materials. The first section of the paper provides the theoretical context for developing the model,…

The ways in which students in grades five and six solve problems is the focus of this paper, which provides background for the staff of the Skills Essential to Learning Television Project, (a multi-level series of video and print resources for classroom use). It considers the problem-solving process categories of understanding, transformation, and…

This paper reviews recent research to determine why children encounter problems understanding what they read. Four points are discussed as especially relevant to children's problems in reading comprehension: (1) reading differs from early language experiences, and an analysis of these differences can indicate likely sources of reading difficulty;…

Summarizes research conducted at the Center for the Study of Reading at the University of Illinois and points out what it means to daily reading instruction. (FL)

The testing effect is a phenomenon that may be described as follows: following the reading of a prose passage, a group of students who are given a posttest on the passage immediately or shortly afterward will later recall more of the passage on a retention test than will a similar group of students who are not given the posttest. Testing as a…

Argues that children's books are agents of socialization and examines childhood as a socially constructed concept throughout history. (SRT)