Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITSs) have begun to develop hybrid systems that balance the learning benefits of ITSs with the motivational benefits of games. iSTART-ME (Motivationally Enhanced) is a new game-based learning environment developed on top of an existing ITS for reading comprehension (iSTART). In an 11 session lab-based study, 40 high…

It is estimated that nearly 70% of high school students in the United States need some form of reading remediation, with the most common need being the ability to comprehend the content and significance of the text (Biancarosa & Snow, 2004). Research findings support the use of visual imagery and keyword cues as effective comprehension…

Theoretical education is mainly based on university text-books, which usually include texts not structured according to any theory of text comprehension. Structuring a text is a demanding process. Text should be organized and structured in order to include descriptions on micro and macro-level representation of the knowledge domain. Since this is…

The purposes of this review were to determine: (1) if different writing activities were more effective than others in improving students' reading comprehension, and (2) if obtained differences among writing activities was related to how reading comprehension was measured? Meta-analysis was used to examine these questions across studies involving…

The present study examined the factor structures across features of 446 examinees' responses to a writing task that integrates reading and listening modalities as well as reading and listening comprehension items of the TOEFL iBT[R] (Internet-based test). Both human and automated scores obtained for the integrated essays were utilized. Based on a…

Reading comprehension is an area of difficulty for many individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). According to the Simple View of Reading, word recognition and oral language are both important determinants of reading comprehension ability. We provide a novel test of this model in 100 adolescents with ASD of varying intellectual ability.…

Poor literacy achievement among English learners has contributed significantly to their high dropout rates, poor job prospects, and high poverty rates. The National Literacy Panel on Language Minority Children and Youth has suggested that English learners benefit from the same direct, systematic instruction in the five essential components of…

The purpose of this exploratory study was to develop and test a strategy to support middle grade students' persuasive writing skills. The sample included 52 eighth-grade students who were either proficient or struggling writers. The students were randomly assigned to either receive training on a graphic organizer designed to scaffold effective…

The purpose of this article is to provide a review on the effectiveness of story mapping to improve the reading comprehension skills of middle and high school (Grades 6-12) students with learning disabilities (LD). An extensive review of the special education research-base revealed twelve (N = 12) story mapping intervention studies that met our…

Social studies instruction in upper elementary school (Grades 3-5) is important for building foundational content knowledge to equip students for the secondary school curriculum. Due to numerous school initiatives and demands on the time of teachers, social studies instruction can play second fiddle to reading and mathematics instruction, which…

The present study explored the interrelations between foreign language (FL) reading anxiety, FL reading strategy use and their interactive effect on FL reading comprehension performance at the tertiary level in China. Analyses of the survey data collected from 1702 university students yielded the following results: (a) Both Foreign Language…

In 2 experiments the authors investigated whether assigning a perspective to middle school students prior to reading a long informational text would improve their reading comprehension. Pretest-posttest control group designs were employed in both experiments, in Experiment 1 (n = 146 fifth- and sixth-grade students) and in Experiment 2 (n = 83…

This study investigated the efficacy of a multi-component reading comprehension instructional approach, Collaborative Strategic Reading (CSR), compared to business-as-usual instructional methods with 19 teachers and 1074 students in middle school social studies and science classrooms in a large urban district. Researchers collaborated with school…

An adaptation of the traditional literary concept of close reading was developed for use in a largely multilingual classroom in which both first language (L1) and second language (L2) students were struggling to comprehend theoretical, lexically dense texts in English. This simplified method of reading a text iteratively and critically is proving…

This meta-analysis synthesizes the literature on interventions for struggling readers in Grades 4 through 12 published between 1980 and 2011. It updates Scammacca et al.'s analysis of studies published between 1980 and 2004. The combined corpus of 82 study-wise effect sizes was meta-analyzed to determine (a) the overall effectiveness of reading…