The problems arising from treating word and sentence complexity as the direct causes of difficulty in comprehension are surveyed in this paper from the perspective of readability formulas. The basic choices and assumptions made in the development and use of readability formulas are discussed in relation to the larger question of text…

Comparing traditional to experiential instruction, a study investigated whether teaching content area vocabulary using hands-on experiences and teacher/student interaction would result in greater vocabulary knowledge and better comprehension of a related text than conventional dictionary work. Subjects, 45 fourth grade students from a chapter 1…

Using an advance organizer, an instructional aid designed to precede a main passage and to provide an effective organizational framework for older adults who may not have spontaneously employed their own strategy for understanding written material, a study investigated whether (1) reading comprehension could be instructionally influenced and (2)…

The effectiveness of the Chicago Mastery Learning Reading (CMLR) Program implemented in Ontario's Kettleby Public Schools (KPS) was measured by the students' reading progress and comparisons with the progress of other students in French immersion (FI) and other non-FI programs, including a gifted program. Within six months of CMLR implementation,…

The first of a series of four, this booklet is designed to interest and involve 9- to 11-year-olds in learning about human development. "Fun to Grow On" focuses specifically on helping elementary school children share and enjoy some simple activities with preschool children. The activities are intended to teach older children that (1) each person…

The first purpose of this study was to examine the relationships between changes made during the development of written instruction and the effectiveness of the materials when presented to students. For this purpose, the Written Instruction Stylistic Evaluation was used to assess the comprehensibility of passages before administration of the…

Experienced teachers enrolled in two graduate reading classes examined seven informal reading inventories (IRIs)--three at the elementary level and four at the secondary level--to (1) discover what text types (narrative or expository) they used at each level to measure student comprehension skills and determine instructional levels and (2)…

A study examined the usefulness of two rules of syllabification: (1) if the first vowel or vowel digraph in a word is followed by two consonants that are not parts of a consonant digraph, the first syllable ends with the first of the two consonants, such as, nor-mal; and (2) if the first vowel or vowel digraph in a word is followed by a single…

This student workbook contains instructional units dealing with developing reading, writing, and listening skills and using a newspaper. Addressed in the unit on reading and writing skills are finding main ideas; mastering reading attack skills; improving memory skills; learning words from context; skimming; developing vocabulary; improving study…

To test the validity of the Watson-Barker Listening Test (WBLT), a study was conducted based on the hypothesis that there is a curvilinear relationship between receiver apprehension and listening ability. Subjects, 120 undergraduate speech students, completed the Receiver Apprehension Test (RAT) and the WBLT. Analysis of the data revealed a…

Arguing that listening is a skill that should be taught systematically in the schools, this paper presents a rationale and strategies for implementing listening instruction in the classroom. The paper first contrasts convergent and divergent thinking, noting that creativity and problem solving are in this latter mode. Next, it examines definitions…

Scores from the Stanford Achievement Tests administered to 50,000 students in Palm Beach County, Florida, were studied in order to determine whether the speeded nature of the reading comprehension subtest was related to inconsistencies in the score profiles. Specifically, the probable effect of random guessing was examined. Reading scores were…

Automaticity training was provided to an experimental group of eight high school sophomores whose reading achievement fell below the seventy-fifth percentile on the New Jersey Minimum Basic Skills Test to determine the effect of such training on reading comprehension. The 16 subjects (experimental and control groups) were pretested using the Gates…

A review of National Assessment of Educational Progress findings presents a picture of the reading attitudes of a large segment of the American population, and of the relationship between reading attitudes and reading performance. The findings show that a negative attitude toward reading exists, and that it increases with each year spent in…

This study compared the reliability and validity of two different measures of reading ability, the Degrees of Reading Power (DRP) and the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills (ITBS) Reading test and the ITBS Vocabulary test. The data consisted of scores of 377 grade 5 and grade 6 students on these tests, along with their assigned reading levels in the…