Concerned with the relationship of a print awareness indicator to subsequent reading achievement, a study measured changes in the development of print awareness across age and grade levels as well as across time. It also compared the levels of print awareness in lower ability and educationally disadvantaged children in second and third grades to…

The passage comprehensibility of three diagnostic reading tests--the Stanford Diagnostic Reading Test, the Spache Diagnostic Reading Scales, and the Durrell Analysis of Reading Difficulty--was evaluated using the following text variables: content familiarity, vocabulary, the number of idea units in the text, the number of text-based inferences…

Two studies examined the relationship between word knowledge and reading comprehension. Subjects were college undergraduates with high and low verbal abilities as indicated by a standardized verbal aptitude test. The first study involved a multiple choice vocabulary test from which words that both groups defined correctly were selected. The…

Through an integration of teacher effectiveness and reading research, this paper proposes ways for improving classroom reading instruction. The first part of the paper reviews teacher effectiveness research, noting the shifts that have occurred in that area from the early efforts, which focused on identifying and describing teacher characteristics…

A developmental study investigated the pictorial and linguistic main idea identification skills of 104 students in second, fifth, and eighth grades. In the pictorial task, the subjects studied a complete picture story and ranked the effectiveness of four separate main idea alternatives at capturing the meaning of the story. Following the same…

Studied for its effects on the reading fluency of elementary school students, R. C. Heckleman's Neurological Impress Method has proved an inexpensive but effective method for motivating low achievement readers. Twenty-six subjects from grades 2 to 6 practiced reading in unison with a tutor during four 15-minute sessions a week. During the sessions…

Readers as well as writers compose meaning. Using the same characteristics essential to effective writing--planning, drafting, aligning, revising, and monitoring--readers react creatively with the text. In response to the author's intention and their own knowledge base, they decide what they want to get from their reading. Constantly renegotiating…

The limited existing research on text structure and its effects on reading comprehension in English as a native language and English as a second language (ESL) is reviewed, and studies that have shown facilitating effects on first language reading comprehension of explicitly teaching text structure are discussed. A research project in progress…

To explore the issue of educational content in basal readers, a study analyzed 34 basal reading textbooks, representing eight of the most commonly used series in American elementary education. Educational content was defined and categorized along three dimensions: subject matter, function, and ethos. The subject matter component covered theories,…

Fry's Readability Graph was used to determine the readability levels of the 1981 Scott, Foresman and Co. basal textbook series for grades one through six. The readability levels were then compared to those established for the 1978 edition. In the 1981 edition, all stories were handscored. Poems, skill lessons, and plays were not examined in order…

Interference between languages such as Spanish and English has a number of aspects, and one of the factors may be socioeconomic. (RB)

No evidence was found to indicate that grammatical reading interference is an important factor in the poor reading achievement of Black youngsters. (JH)

To determine the number and types of spelling errors made by college students, a study examined students' spelling errors on four complex word patterns which occur in related words. Fifty students attending a four-year engineering institute were selected and classified as group A (good readers/good spellers) or group B (poor readers/poor spellers)…

A study compared performance on a silent informal reading inventory and achievement on a standardized reading test, focusing on students' individual skill needs and how effective tests were in identifying specific strengths and weaknesses in these skill areas. Subjects, 25 students entering fourth grade in a primarily middle class suburban…

This study was conducted to determine how well the Degrees of Reading Power (DRP) correctly identifies children who are experiencing reading difficulties and to describe more precisely the characteristics of children who have been identified as poor readers so that program planners can design more effective remedial instruction. The DRP and…