College students differing in verbal ability read and evaluated their comprehension of expository passages. Three different types of problems were embedded within the passages to provide opportunities for students to reveal the use of different standards of evaluation. Half of the subjects were informed that they should use three particular…

Indicates that readers monitor their comprehension as they read, evaluating whether the ideas expressed in the text are consistent with one another. (AEA)

Two experiments examined children's ability to apply three different standards for evaluating their understanding. Five-, seven-, nine-, and eleven-year-old children were presented with short narrative passages within which were embedded three types of problems (nonsense words, internal inconsistencies, and prior knowledge violations), each of…

Metacognition refers to knowledge about one's own cognition. The present study was designed to assess metacognitive skills that either precede or follow task engagement, rather than the processes that occur during a task. Specifically, we examined prediction and evaluation skills among children with (n= 17) or without (n= 179) mathematics learning…

Children 5, 7, 9, and 11 years old were presented short narrative passages imbedded with three types of problems which could only be identified by using three specific evaluation standards. Although older children used standards more effectively, overall problem identification was considerably better than that reported in noninstructed settings.…

Fourth and sixth grade children differing in reading proficiency read and commented on brief expository passages containing three different types of embedded problems (nonsense words, prior knowledge violations, and internal inconsistencies). Half of the children were specificially instructed as to the types of standards they should apply in order…

A study involving 80 fourth graders investigated the effects of providing children with training in the use of specific standards for evaluating their reading comprehension. Results indicate that instruction in the use of these standards were generalized to the use of other standards and that the training advantage was maintained over time. (TJH)