The use of integrated tasks to test English-speaking skills raises questions about the impact of comprehension on test score outcomes, and the impact of stimulus materials on test-taker strategic behaviours. This study analysed speaking performances and verbal report data to examine the strategies used by test takers at different levels of…

The purpose of this feasibility study was to inform the development of an intervention to support reading and self-regulation for students with significant reading difficulties and disabilities (RDs), including dyslexia. Participants were 21 special educators, dyslexia specialists, and reading interventionists and 48 students in Grades 2 to 4.…

There is growing recognition of the need to end the debate regarding reading instruction in favor of an approach that provides a solid foundation in phonics and other underlying language skills to become expert readers. We advance this agenda by providing evidence of specific effects of instruction focused primarily on the written code or on…

Introduction: Many ESL college students have reading comprehension problems in English, such as difficulty understanding ideas explicitly or implicitly stated in a text, making inferences, and inferring meanings of difficult words from context. Aims: The article proposes the integration of inspirational quotes in the teaching of English to EFL…

The ability to integrate information that is separated within a text, such as connecting a character's action to a goal stated earlier in the text, is a critical factor in narrative comprehension. In the present study, we analyze the ability of 9- and 11-year olds to integrate such information. In addition, we examined the effect of…

Previous studies have shown that multilingual speakers are influenced by their native (L1) and non-native (L2) grammars when learning a new language. But, so far, these studies have mostly used untimed metalinguistic tasks. Here we examine whether multilinguals' prior grammars also affect their sensitivity to morphosyntactic constraints during…

This study aims to investigate patterns of variation in the interplay of L2 language ability and general reading comprehension skills in L2 reading, by comparing item-level effects of test-takers' results on L1 and L2 reading comprehension tests. The material comes from more than 500,000 people tested on L1 (Swedish) and L2 (English) in the…

This study reports on the instruction provided in district-designed intensive summer reading programs. The Tier 3 intervention was provided to 374 students from 24 school districts who were not meeting the end of third-grade reading benchmarks; students were exiting third grade and entering fourth grade. Observations of the 40 classes were…

Reading difficulties in school are very challenging for teachers due to many different reader subtypes in one and the same class. Moreover, there are few easy-to-use tools enabling teachers to assess reading ability. According to the Simple View of Reading (Hoover and Gough in "Reading and Writing", 2(2), 127-160, 1990), efficient…

This study, using a mixed methods design, examined the use of a photograph-based model to improve students' language and writing skills. Classes were assigned to receive the photograph-based intervention (experimental) or to receive the regular language-based curriculum (control). Both second and fifth grade students in the experimental group…

At start-up of a book distribution programme (Dolly Parton's Imagination Library) in a southeastern United States community, we examined baseline relationships between at-home shared book reading (SBR) and children's language/literacy abilities and skills at kindergarten entry. One hundred fifty-two parent/child dyads participated; children (53%…

The PM Benchmark Reading Assessment Resource (PM Benchmarks) provides information about primary students' level of achievement in reading accurately, fluently, and in understanding unseen texts. As part of the assessment, students have to orally retell what they have read and orally answer comprehension questions. This oral use of language…

Relationships between early literacy measures (i.e., curriculum-based measurement) and advanced literacy measures (i.e., reading comprehension) were examined in young children with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs). Participants in this study were 167 children between the ages of 4 and 7 years (M = 5 years 8 months), who were assessed at 2 time…

Background: Mind wandering (MW) has commonly been linked to bad scholastic performance; however, such association has rarely been investigated in the classroom. Moreover, in examining such association, motivational variables have been largely ignored. Aim: We aimed at examining the associations between the dispositional tendency to engage in MW…

Teachers can potentially address reading comprehension deficits in a content area, such as science, by using the students in their classrooms as resources. We examined the effects of a class-wide partner reading intervention with science reading materials on a measure of content comprehension skills. A total of 65 fourth-grade students and 61…