In this study 60 first and fourth graders selected pictures that best represented the meanings of sentences read to them. Results indicated that children were instantiating the target words with specific concepts rather than bringing to mind abstract, undifferentiated meanings. (HOD)

Describes a procedure for helping students understand and work mathematical word problems. (MKM)

The development of cognitive processes is essential to the development of reading comprehension skills. (MKM)

This article discusses ways of analyzing errors made in oral reading; interpreting mistakes in the correct way enables the teacher to understand why the reader is making them and to help overcome the reading difficulties they indicate. (JD)

In these studies, people recalled additional, previously unrecalled information from stories following instruction to take a new perspective. The data clearly show the operation of retrieval processes independent from encoding processes. (SW)

This study deals with the patterns of word-by-word reading times over a sentence when the subject must code the linguistic information sufficiently for immediate verbatim recall. A class of quantitative models is considered that would account for reading times at phrase breaks. (Author/RM)

Indicates that (1) readers determine topic interrelations as they encounter new topics during reading, (2) better recallers are more consistent about inferring topic interrelations, and (3) better recallers are more flexible in their processing of topic information. (NKA)

Critically examines the assumption underlying research into stages of word recognition provided by R.J. Chabot and others and questions whether their analysis of speed of processing differences warrants making strong conclusions about the nature of reading deficits. (HOD)

Suggests things teachers can tell their students about what may account for successful underlining experiences. (HOD)

Describes a study contrasting hierarchical and causal approaches to story understanding indicating that when the number of causal connections increases, the likelihood of summarization for both goal and other statements increases. Suggests that the importance accorded to a statement in a story structure is the result of causal reasoning during…

Individual differences in working memory capacity affect the probability of resolving apparent inconsistencies in sentences. Resolution was less likely for readers with small working memories. Such readers devote so many resources to reading processes that they have less capacity for retaining earlier verbatim wording in working memory. (Author/RD)

Examines some historical facts surrounding Thorndike's 1917 article, Reading as Reasoning: A Study of Mistakes in Paragraph Reading," (republished in Reading Research Quarterly, 1971, 6, 425-48), in an attempt to put the article in its proper perspective both as a research study and as a contribution to the psychology of reading. (VJ)

Discusses the methodology and the conclusions of Thorndike's 1917 study. (VJ)

Examines and rejects two traditional assumptions about fluent reading: that identification of letters is necessary to identify words; and that identification of words is necessary to comprehend. Proposes that identification and comprehension are two separate tasks and that a reader comprehends because he reads for meaning in the first place. (MB)