Describes teaching strategies for students' initial exposure to nonfiction materials to help students' comprehension of new materials of varying opinions, and integration of new knowledge. Provides specific questions to elicit student understanding and utilization of new content, author, organization, biography, style, publishing conventions,…

These exercises and examples pertain to readability information presented in preceding articles. They are designed to help speech language pathologists test their intuitions about word and text difficulty and to see readability data from a number of quantitative formulas applied to passages across a wide range of levels. (Contains 8 references.)…

Outlines a working model of the 10 elements that make up the teaching method, "instructional conversation." Profiles the use of this method to teach moral education and reading comprehension to an elementary class making the transition from Spanish-reading instruction to English. (MJP)

Investigated how intermediate students of French interacted with a computerized second language reading gloss from three perspectives: (1) the relationship between the group's choice of program options and their comprehension; (2) individual user styles; and (3) student perceptions of program effectiveness. (31 references) (Author/CK)

Describes a classroom exercise that uses a computer simulation to give students a rat's-eye view of a maze. The students call out instructions for navigating the maze. A follow-up presentation examines two theories of learning that explain why the students' are successful in their second navigating attempt. (MJP)

Describes a study conducted in the United Kingdom that assessed recall and comprehension scores of elementary and secondary school children following the viewing of two prime-time science television programs. Predictor variables including age, sex, linguistic fluency, prior television viewing, and reading habits were investigated. (Contains 13…

Implements a literature-based instructional intervention using a series of high interest, predictable trade books. Engages students in story reading supported by teacher modeling of fluent reading, repeated and choral reading of predictable text, and use of multiple cues in written language. Indicates students gained in reading fluency and…

Premised on E.D. Hirsch's call for cultural literacy, argues that school curricula should include law-related courses to promote legal literacy. Contends law-related courses incorporate reading and critical thinking skills and teach citizenship responsibilities. Defines objectives and rationale of law-related courses. Includes list of law-related…

This study tested the hypothesis that effortful interaction with a computer tool that provides reading-related guided interaction on a meta-cognitive level results in the internalization of the guidance and later improved reading comprehension. Results with 25 seventh graders in Tel Aviv using a specially designed tool--the Reading…

Describes study that investigated the effectiveness of a computer-based study guide using hypertext software to increase textbook comprehension among four learning-disabled students in a remedial high school social studies class. Four levels of instructional cues are described that matched students to their highest level of independent interaction…

Describes study that was designed to investigate fifth graders' use of microcomputer-based reading assistance for science text comprehension. The three levels of assistance offered are described, the research software created for the project is explained, results are analyzed, and further research needs are suggested. (42 references) (LRW)

This study compared the effects of chunking sentences on the retention and comprehension of two groups of learning disabled high school students, who received chunked reading via computer assisted instruction (CAI) or traditional methods. Both experimental groups performed better on the posttest than the control group, who received CAI without…

Describes study that examined the effects of computer use in the literacy program for communication disordered elementary school students, and determined which literacy effects could be attributed to problem-solving software and which to word processing software. Treatments for the experimental and control groups are described, and results are…

Describes a study of 80 undergraduate foreign language learners that compared the use of a hyper-reference source incorporating an electronic dictionary and a conventional paper dictionary. Measures of consultation frequency, study time, efficiency, and comprehension are examined; bilingual and monolingual dictionary use is compared; and further…

Investigated the efficacy of two related reciprocal teaching interventions--with cooperative grouping or with cross-age tutoring--on the reading comprehension of learning disabled English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) students. Found no significant difference between the two groups: both made comprehension gains and continued to improved when…