Using sixth-grade students, a study examines (1) relationships between background knowledge and passage comprehension, (2) relative usefulness of certain variations in measuring available knowledge, (3) value of a background measure as applied to a teacher-directed small group prereading language and concept organizer activity, and (4) effect of a…

Points out, by citing a recently completed longitudinal study at the University of Iowa, that children are more likely to discover how reading works and make it work for them if the book is not too hard. (EL)

Reports on a study that investigated which of four modes of reading (oral reading to an audience, oral reading to oneself, silent reading, silent reading while listening) best facilitates fifth-grade students' comprehension. Concludes that for these students as a whole, comparable comprehension may be expected when they read to themselves or read…

Indicates that students who received organizational instruction wrote better summaries than did students who received traditional instruction. (FL)

Describes two programs that involved teachers using closed-captioned television materials to develop skills in the areas of reading comprehension, vocabulary, and oral reading fluency with hearing, remedial readers. (FL)

Studies how children negotiate the meaning of literature by examining how they responded when given the opportunity to retell a story directly after hearing it. (DF)

Describes how textbook activity guides that emphasize active student involvement through cooperative learning and a self monitoring component can help students become active, flexible, more effective readers of textbook materials. (HOD)

Reports a study designed to answer the question of whether English as a second language (ESL) reading can be facilitated by explicit teaching of text structure. Results indicate that training on the top-level rhetorical organization of expository texts significantly increased the amount of information that 25 intermediate-level ESL students could…

Current theory and research into the oral-written relationship are reviewed. Three models of reading comprehension based on oral-written language skills are reviewed as representative and their implications for reading instruction in grades 4-12 and in bilingual-bicultural classrooms are determined. The mingling of oral and literate strategies, in…

Reports on research showing that the use of a process-oriented writing program did not improve students' reading ability. (DF)

Compares the processing of English words by Chinese-English bilinguals with that of monolingual English speakers. Subjects read and rated English words for their contribution to sentence structure and meaning. It was found that bilinguals generally rated English words as contributing more to sentence structure and meaning than did monolinguals.…

Describes the Vocabulary Self-Collection Strategy, a strategy that differs from traditional instruction through its use of student generated word lists and its emphasis on students' personal experience and world knowledge. (HOD)

Examines the relations among general language competency factors such as word knowledge, comprehension, and paradigmatic/syntagmatic reasoning, and college developmental readers' ability to interpret two text formats designed to elicit either a literal or figurative interpretation. (DF)

Discusses cognitive processes readers engage in when comprehending instructional text and identifies familiar devices utilized by authors of instructional materials to support each of these processes. Included are appropriate vocabulary and sentence syntax use for intended audience; listing instructional objectives; and use of hierarchical…

Compared comprehension of kindergarten-age precocious readers (who read at the third-grade level) with second- and third-grade-age children. Results on measures of letter, scrambled word, and text reading times indicated that, for precocious readers, efficiency in lower-order tasks is not a prerequisite for rapid text reading and good…