Reading comprehension is key to knowledge acquisition and to reinforcing memory for previous information. While reading, a mental representation is constructed in the reader's mind. The mental model comprises the words in the text, the relations between the words, and inferences linking to concepts in prior knowledge. The automated model of…

A broad categorisation of different reading styles for mathematics text is generated in this research. The styles derive from those found in literature around academic reading skills. These styles are inductively refined using video transcripts of five specially chosen students studying out loud from a prescribed mathematics textbook. The context…

This paper proposes a new theoretical framework for reading instruction in second/foreign language classrooms. The theoretical framework introduced in this paper is called the Schematic Information-Processing (SIP) model of reading comprehension and is a combination of video-based instruction and various reading comprehension theories, models, and…

Research demonstrates that intrinsic motivation "drives students' amount of reading" and that students who read for pleasure, to explore topics they care about, and for interest "read a lot and achieve greatly" (Guthrie 2). As teachers incline their pedagogy to student interests, ownership, self- efficacy, social interaction,…

This theoretical review is an overview of three important theories: schema theory, information-processing theory, and sociocultural theory. Second/foreign language teachers need to familiarize themselves with these theories if they want to teach culturally unfamiliar texts more successfully in their language classrooms. Although each of these…

Reading comprehension is multidimensional and complex. The persistent challenges children, adolescents, and even adults face with reading comprehension call for concerted efforts to develop assessments that help identify sources of difficulties and to design instructional approaches to prevent or ameliorate these difficulties. Doing so requires…

Existing reading assessments have increasingly been criticized by researchers, educators, and policy makers, especially regarding their coverage, utility, and authenticity (e.g., Magliano, Millis, Ozuru, & McNamara, 2007; Pellegrino, Chudowsky, & Glaser, 2001; Rupp, Ferne, & Choi, 2006). Specifically, there is concern that current…

How the brain learns to read has been the subject of much neuroscience educational research. Evidence is mounting for identifiable networks of connected neurons that are particularly active during reading processes such as response to visual and auditory stimuli, relating new information to prior knowledge, long-term memory storage, comprehension,…

In this article, the authors discuss thematic solutions using young adult literature to increase reading comprehension. Here, they emphasize that prior knowledge plays a very important role in the reading process. As students read, they actively "construct meaning through the integration of existing and new knowledge and the flexible use of…

Viewed as discourse, official forms exhibit identifiable text characteristics and elicit strategies for comprehension that take into account these characteristics, as well as context and the user's prior knowledge about the world. However, forms also have unique characteristics that require processes and strategies which differ in systematic ways…

The main experience of an ideal reader while reading a text is an "envisionment" of that text, a representation in the reader's mind of the content of the text. According to this view the envisionment grows and sometimes changes as the reader progresses through the text, and the ideal reader not only updates and supplements the…

The authors examined whether the influence of reading purpose on reported use of text-processing strategies was moderated by students' prior knowledge about the topic of the text. Using multiple regression analyses with interaction terms, they found that the effect of reading purpose on reported use of memorization and elaboration strategies…

Describes how content area teachers balked at the need for prereading activities. Discusses how the teacher realized the importance of such activities through a variety of inservice activities. (RS)

Research and theory on second language reading has reached heightened dimensions in recent years. It is through reading that learners access much information concerning the target language and culture, and consequently reading is an important part of almost all language programs across stages of acquisition. The purpose of this article is to offer…

The article suggests that English literacy can be acquired by deaf children through developmental reading and writing activities that refelct principles of first language acquisition as students relate these activities to experiences which they have already linguistically represented. (Author/CB)