An earlier series of pilot studies and small-scale experimental studies had previously provided some evidence for the efficacy of a small group early literacy intervention program for young struggling readers. The present paper provides further evidence for efficacy based on a much larger sample of young, socially disadvantaged, at-risk readers.…

Learners with poor reading skills are less able to acquire knowledge through text. Graphic novels may enhance reading comprehension skills owing to fewer words, more pictures, and an engaging storyline. This study considered the reading skills of 188 Chinese-English bilingual undergraduates, comparing their reading comprehension performance after…

This study used the lexicality effects on N400 to investigate orthographic processing in children with developmental dyslexia. Participants performed a Go/No-Go semantic judgment task; three types of stimuli--real characters (RC), pseudocharacters (PC), and noncharacters (NC)--were embedded in No-Go trials. Two types of lexicality effects (RC vs.…

This study sought to better understand the prevalence of concurrent and specific difficulties in reading fluency and vocabulary among adolescents with low reading comprehension. Latent class analysis (LCA) was used to identify a sample of 180 students in sixth through eighth grades with reading comprehension difficulties. A subsequent LCA…

Schools are expected to fulfil different types of goals, including citizenship development. An important question is to what extent schools can simultaneously promote different learning outcomes. In this paper, we investigate the relationship between language ability and youth citizenship. Using a representative sample of 2429 grade 6 pupils (age…

The present study evaluated which components within the simple view of reading model better predicted reading comprehension in a sample of bilingual language-minority children exposed to Italian, a highly transparent language, as a second language. The sample included 260 typically developing bilingual children who were attending either the first…

This article illustrates the value of large-scale impact evaluations with counterfactual components. It begins by exploring the limitations of small-scale impact studies, which do not allow reliable inference to a wider population or which do not use valid comparison groups. The paper then describes the design features of a recent large-scale…

Purpose: International exam scores of Turkish students, specifically of Project for International Student Achievement, attest that the level of comprehension of Turkish students is not satisfactory. Learning styles can be of use to schools in designing reading programs and materials to help Turkish students to improve their reading achievement.…

This article looks at the changes made to examinations in England over recent decades and asks about the politics behind the changes. It considers how increasingly centralised the assessment regime has become, moving from a system where teachers could have a say in how pupils are assessed to a regime dominated by government approved tests. It…

Background: Predicated on Vygotsky's zone of proximal development (ZPD), dynamic assessment (DA) integrates teaching with assessment in a single activity by providing mediation to help learners perform beyond their independent functioning and simultaneously promote learner development. It advantages over traditional psychometric tests in that DA…

Previous studies (Collins, 2015; Kennan & Meenan, 2014) have shown how variations in text and task factors and individual reader skills affect performance on reading comprehension assessments. The present study examined whether different presentation conditions (silent reading, watching a video) and response formats (open-ended vs.…

The degree to which the utilization of technology supports the academic achievement of sixth grade students with reading disabilities was examined using a quantitative research design. The data analysis involved the results from the Educational Technology Assessment Program to measure achievement. The Standardized Test for the Assessment of…

Theatre instructional techniques, including reader's theatre and process drama teaching strategies, have been employed as instructional strategies in classrooms to enhance reading comprehension and vocabulary learning in students. In this era of increasing accountability for educational outcomes, quantifying what, if any, impact such instructional…

This study investigates the relationship between School Library and Students' achievement on a population sample of 9896 Schools. Many international researches confirmed the importance of the School Library for the Students learning. Recently the IEA PIRLS survey has revealed a positive relationship between the Reading comprehension performance…

Home language (HL) effects on academic language literacy have been extensively discussed. However, previous research has mostly focused on Indo--European languages. This study extends the literature by using data (n = 17,600) collected in a diversified language area: Guangxi, China. We examined the effects of four HLs and four socioeconomic…