A growing body of research suggests that comprehension of expository texts presented digitally is a challenging endeavor, particularly for children. Many reading interventions, both from traditional classroom settings and computer-based contexts, have focused on much needed strategy instruction but have simultaneously neglected a focus on…

The purpose of the current mixed-methods study was to investigate the effectiveness of a traditional and novel knowledge activation technique for supporting fifth and sixth graders' comprehension of exposition covering unfamiliar content. For the quantitative portion, 149 rural middle-school students were randomly assigned to 1 of 3 conditions:…

"Seductive details" refers to interesting pieces of information within an expository text that are only tangentially related to the target concept (Garner, Gillingham, & White, 1989). When the presence of this information results in reduced comprehension, this is called the "seductive details effect." Previous work has…

Misconceptions impair not only learners' comprehension of a text but also the accuracy with which they judge their comprehension, that is, "metacomprehension accuracy." Refutation texts are beneficial to elicit conceptual-change processes and thus to overcome the detrimental impact of misconceptions on comprehension. However, it is…

In this meta-analysis of 45 studies involving students in Grades 2-12, the authors present evidence on the effects of text structure instruction on the expository reading comprehension of students. The meta-analysis was deigned to answer 2 sets of questions. The first set of questions examined the effectiveness of text structure instruction on…

The present study examined possible memory and metacomprehension benefits of using a combined question self-generation and answering technique, relative to rereading, as a study strategy for expository passages. In the 2 question self-generation and answering conditions (detail or conceptual questions), participants were prompted on how to…

This study evaluated the effectiveness of an intervention for second graders at risk for academic failure, which taught reading comprehension embedded in social studies content. The intervention included instruction about the structure of cause/effect expository text, emphasizing clue words, generic questions, graphic organizers, and close…

The effects of four major types of expository text on the comprehension performance of 69 third and 69 sixth graders were investigated. Results suggest that knowledge of discourse types underlies effective expository comprehension and that this ability increases as children reach the upper elementary grades. (BS)

In 3 experiments, a total of 48 native English speaking and 55 English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) college students chose alternatives to replace missing logical connectors in expository passages. Differences in meaning and use of the four connector types and implications for improving ESL programing are discussed. (SLD)

Principles of W. Kintsch's reading comprehension model (1978, 1980) were used to revise an expository text. Two experiments with 170 undergraduates and 125 Air Force recruits indicated that the principled revision conveyed the author's intentions better than the original text, suggesting the model's use for text improvement. (SLD)