Literacy education for children, youth, and adults in America is in critical need of reconstruction. The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) keeps pace with research findings on the basic skills of these groups, yet in literacy education, these findings have not always been used to examine the effects of instructional variables on…

This annotated bibliography lists research on current practices and selected new practices in the teaching of reading comprehension. The introduction states the problem, the purpose of the study, its organization and limitations, and includes a glossary of terms. The 29 annotations are in two broad categories: research dealing with classroom…

This study investigated the use readers make of visual and verbal illustration to understand and remember what they have read. Specific focus was placed on readers' use of pictures and analogies to understand and remember written directions for a spatial manipulation task. The independent variables measured were type of text, mode of illustration,…

A study was conducted to determine how a reader identifies and represents the major topics in a text and their interrelationships. Subjects, 56 college students, read two texts one sentence at a time. Each text contained 12 paragraphs that discussed six attributes of two major topics. The paragraphs on one text were organized by attribute, while…

Working on the assumption that when reading comprehension is viewed from a constructivist framework, where meaning grows and changes as the text progresses, categorization into comprehension levels such as literal and inferential will be misleading, two third grade standardized multiple choice test items were selected from a larger body of test…

A study investigated at what point during eye fixations visual information is used in furthering the reading process. The study identified two aspects of information processing: registration, in which a light pattern on the retina triggers a pattern of neural activity in the visula cortex; and utilization, in which the registered pattern has an…

A study investigated the effectiveness of teaching children how to take reading comprehension tests. Twenty-eight fifth grade students were pretested using the Gates-MacGinitie Reading Test, Survey D, Form I. The students were tested on speed and accuracy, vocabulary, and comprehension. Students were given 30 minutes of daily instruction and…

A study examined the influence of preschool reading readiness skills instruction on first graders' reading achievement. The subjects were 52 first grade students who had attended preschool, and their parents. The parents received questionnaires containing 40 reading readiness questions and the children took the California Achievement Test (CAT) in…

Contributing to the study of historical aspects of the reading profession, this 33-item annotated bibliography of books and articles on William Holmes McGuffey (1800-1873) and his "McGuffey Eclectic Readers" (more than half the schoolchildren of America from 1836 to about 1920 learned to read from the "McGuffey Readers") is…

A study examined the effects of training in a self-generated learning strategy on students' ability to comprehend text and self-monitor their understanding while engaging in strategic text processing. The study also explored the extent to which grade level and passage difficulty interacted with training to produce treatment effects. Subjects, 36…

Divided into sections on the reading process, positive effects of literature in a reading program, and basic instructional elements of a literature-based reading program, this 39-item annotated bibliography of journal articles and monographs dating back to 1968 presents research concerning the use of literature in the reading curriculum. An…

Advanced knowledge acquisition in a subject area is different in many important ways from introductory learning (and from expertise). In this paper some of the special characteristics of advanced learning of complex conceptual material are discussed. The paper notes that these characteristics are often at odds with the goals and tactics of…

In order for necessary reform in the reading curriculum to occur, a great debate in the teaching of reading is needed. Instructional management systems (or mastery learning) with their measurable objectives should be compared with holistic philosophies in reading instruction. A holistic approach to reading instruction should be implemented.…

A study investigated the importance adults assign to various techniques used in the design and production of print educational material. Subjects, 103 adults who regularly receive printed educational information and professionals engaged in the production of such information, completed a survey including demographic information, time spent in…

A study examined how specific developmental levels of cognitive ability affect the relationship between beliefs and performance; how cognitive development levels affect reading and writing performance; and how developmental level affects the interactions between the reading and writing domains. Subjects, 150 undergraduates between the ages of 18…