The domino effect of illiteracy can be halted if students are given opportunity early in life to develop a positive attitude toward reading. Research supports the notion that reading interests lead to knowledge, which leads, in turn, to increased comprehension. Motivational ideas include using trade books and literature as collateral material in…

A study examined the relationship between types of miscues made by readers during oral reading and the errors made by the same readers on a cloze task. Subjects were 79 third and 78 fifth grade students in eight intact classrooms. Both the oral reading miscues and the cloze replacements were categorized using a modification of Y. Goodman's miscue…

This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 26 titles deal with a variety of topics, including the following: (1) individual differences in the use of comprehension strategies; (2) field dependence-independence and text comprehension; (3) automaticity of word…

Designed to present a historical account of instructional approaches to the teaching of comprehension as well as insights into effective approaches for the present and the future, this collection of papers is divided into three parts, concerned respectively with: (1) instructional research in reading comprehension, (2) the reader and the text, and…

Two studies analyzed self-regulatory cognitions of students asked to study complex instruction texts; examined the relationship between self-regulation and performance; assessed self-regulatory processes during learning from text in detail; and examined how pictures integrated in instructional text were processed by learners with different degrees…

A study assessed the utility and effectiveness of two interactive computer programs designed to instruct and model effective strategies for reading biology and psychology textbooks. Intended for undergraduates, the two programs were developed at Indiana University's Learning Skills Center, and were designed to teach students how to: (1) identify…

A study examined preschool children's awareness of literacy. Subjects included 18 children from 2 classrooms of prekindergarten children who lived in a black, inner-city neighborhood and attended a school that believed in providing formal reading and writing instruction in the prekindergarten year. Subjects were asked how they were learning, how…

The first part of this report reviews an extensive series of studies concerned with the reciprocal teaching of comprehension fostering and monitoring strategies--an instructional method in which an adult teacher and a group of students take turns leading a dialogue aimed at revealing the meaning of the text. The studies reviewed indicate that…

Focusing on the reading-thinking-learning process, the classrooms in which such processes occur, and the means for studying these processes, this book presents essays on teaching, learning, and assessing the reading process. The first section contains essays on learning contexts that are interactive and participatory, while essays in the second…

A study was conducted to develop a questionnaire for gauging student perceptions of the graphic climate (the extent to which students habitually use and construct appropriate graphics during the reading and studying process) in middle and high school history classes. The questionnaire was a 4-point Likert scale consisting of 18 questions, five of…

A study was conducted to determine the patterns of questioning behaviors exhibited by four preservice and four inservice teachers in an inner-city elementary school. Specifically, the study examined the types of questions teachers asked, the types of responses given by students, the wait-time between questions that teachers provided for high- and…

This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 35 titles deal with a variety of topics, including the following: (1) developmental patterns of good and poor readers; (2) teacher perception of principal leadership behavior and student reading achievement; (3) cognitive style…

Papers delivered at the second American Reading Forum are collected in this yearbook. While all of the essays focus on the theme of reading in the disciplines, many of them respond to a preceding essay. The essays and reactions cover a variety of topics, including the following: (1) a qualitative analysis of reading instruction in low level…

As part of a continuing series, this book contains 27 conference papers, which reflect the theme of reading as a process of creating meaning for sensed stimuli. Titles, among others, cover the following topics: (1) writing and reading in a balanced curriculum; (2) the creation and discovery of meaning; (3) learning disabilities; (4) key words and…

Because thematic statements are too global to aid poor readers in comprehending texts, a series of studies using a common procedure was conducted to determine the relationship between teaching thematic concepts prior to reading and reading comprehension. The thematic organizers used in the studies contained three paragraphs that defined the…