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An important reading skill that is often overlooked by educators is reading fluency. There is a paucity of studies that have investigated computer programs that address this and other critical reading skills. Reading Assistant™ is a form of computer-assisted instruction that uses speech recognition technology and research supported strategies to target reading fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. The purpose of the present study was to examine the effects of Reading Assistant™ on the oral reading fluency and comprehension skills of second through third grade students considered at-risk for reading failure. A total of eight participants were involved in this study across a 6- to 8-week intervention period. In order to evaluate the impact of Reading Assistant™, a multiple baseline across participants design was used. Multiple sources of data were collected to determine the overall effectiveness of the Reading Assistant™ computer program. Data for reading fluency was collected using AIMSweb reading curriculum based measurement (CBM) probes while data for reading comprehension was collected using AIMSweb maze CBM probes. The effect of the Reading Assistant™ computer program was also evaluated by determining the rate of improvement (ROI) as well as by calculating the percentage of non-overlapping data points (PND). The results of this study suggest that Reading Assistant™ may have been somewhat effective for improving the oral reading fluency and reading comprehension skills, but only for some of the participants. The effect size data do not provide a convincing demonstration that Reading Assistant™ had a substantial impact on the majority of struggling readers involved in this study. Further research is needed to establish the effectiveness of Reading Assistant™ as an intervention for reading fluency.

This case study, conducted during the 2014-2015 school year, examined the reading comprehension instruction and assessment practices at an elementary school implementing the Response to Intervention (RtI) framework. Observed assessment practices were compared to what the International Literacy Association (ILA) deems appropriate assessment standards for literacy achievement. 3 educators from an elementary school (~ 750 students) participated in this case study. The participants included females of various backgrounds; a school administrator, lead teacher, and fourth grade classroom teacher. 3 research questions guided this case study: (1) What does reading comprehension assessment look like in a school implementing RtI?; (2) What is the relationship between reading comprehension instruction and assessment in a school implementing RtI?; (3) In what ways are reading comprehension assessment practices in a school implementing RtI consistent or inconsistent with ILA assessment guidelines that focus on multiple dimensions of literacy, new literacies and using assessment to improve teaching and learning? Initial and follow-up interviews were conducted as well as observations, and artifacts were examined in relation to reading comprehension instruction, assessment, and RtI. Data were analyzed at 2 levels – the school and classroom. From this analysis 4 themes were identified regarding the nature of assessments: (a) Administrators valued and required teachers to use multiple summative assessments to track students’ progression and make decisions regarding students’ remediation; (b) Teachers’ reading instruction decisions were heavily influenced by district, state, and national education mandates; (c) Teachers used formative assessment data to inform reading instruction, but questioned its validity and the quality of their instruction when results contradicted summative assessment data; and (d) The school’s assessment practices were not reflective of the International Literacy Association’s Assessment Standards. Results also included the role of the federal initiative Response to Intervention (RtI) and its impact on assessment practices. The findings of the study suggest implications for school and district administrators, classroom teachers, and teacher educators.

There is a perception among faculty at the University of Technology, Jamaica (UTech) that Industrial Technology students in the Faculty of Education and Liberal Studies (FELS-IT) have difficulty learning non-technical content due to their weak reading-comprehension skills. Reciprocal Teaching strategies have been shown to improve students reading-comprehension and learning, especially across the United States and Europe (Palincsar and Brown, 1984; Rosenshine and Meister, 1993, 1994). By means of a researcher-developed Cloze-type assessment instrument, this study investigated reciprocal teaching (Palincsar and Brown, 1984) as a possible means of addressing this perceived problem in Jamaica. A total of 133 participants were involved in the study. Specifically, the study explored empirically the existence of a reading-comprehension problem among the first-year Industrial Technology teacher-education majors at UTech, and the self-perceptions of the participants with respect to their reading-comprehension skills. The study primarily investigated the effect of the reciprocal teaching strategy on improving reading-comprehension scores at the tertiary level, and its perceived efficacy by the participants. An evaluation of the evidence-based findings was used to determine whether to recommend implementing reciprocal teaching into the UTech teaching methodologies, with the overarching aim of improving student achievement. The findings of this quasi-experimental study suggest that the FELS-IT first-year teacher- education majors are not significantly different from other first-year students enrolled at UTech. Also, the reciprocal teaching intervention significantly improved the group-mean and individual post-test scores of the Treatment group over those of the Control group, and was favorably perceived. The investigation recommends that reciprocal teaching should be implemented across all faculties at UTech, preferably among the first-year students. / Ph. D.

The results from the international surveys PISA 2011 and PIRLS 2011 shows that Swedish students have been deteriorating in reading comprehension. The main purpose of this literature study was to do a research review over different methods that intend to increase students’ reading comprehension by including students’ background knowledge. The method that is applied is a systematic literature study. The result of the study shows two bigger specializations of teaching methodics within reading comprehension, strategy oriented, and contextual teaching methods. The difference between these methods is hardly worth mentioning, but the contextual method is proven to be more efficient. Despite this the strategy oriented teaching method is to a great extent more researched. The result also shows that a new orientation within the research of reading comprehension is growing, where the focus is on the teachers’ knowledge and competence, instead of on teaching methods. A conclusion of the study is that all teaching methods that have been presented in the study develop the students’ reading comprehension in an effective way. It is also shown that the teacher has a big responsibility for the development within students’ reading comprehension. / Resultaten av de internationella undersökningarna PISA 2011 och PIRLS 2011 visar att de svenska elevernas resultat inom läsförståelse försämrats. Syftet med denna litteraturstudie var att göra en forskningsöversikt för att kunna ge en fördjupad bild av olika metoder som inkluderar elevers tidigare kunskaper inom läsförståelse, och som anses öka elevernas läsförståelse. Metoden som används är en systematisk litteraturstudie. Resultatet av studien visar på två större inriktningar av undervisningsmetodik inom läsförståelse, strategiinriktad, och innehållsbaseras undervisningsmetodik. Skillnaderna mellan dessa är minimala, men den innehållsbaserade undervisningsmetodiken har visat sig vara lite effektivare. Trots detta är den strategiinriktade undervisningsmetodiken i stor utsträckning mer beforskad. Resultatet visar även att en ny inriktning inom forskningen av läsförståelse växer fram, där fokuset ligger på lärarens kunskaper och kompetens, istället för undervisningsmetoder. En slutsats av studien är att samtliga undervisningsmetoder som presenterats i studien utvecklar elevers läsförståelse på ett effektivt sätt, samt att läraren har ett stort ansvar för elevernas läsförståelseutveckling. / <p>svenska</p>

Reciprocal teaching comprehension-monitoring is a reading comprehension instructional procedure that combines four instructional strategies: predicting, summarizing, questioning, and clarifying to enhance students' comprehension of text. The procedure is a dialogue between the teacher and the students. During reciprocal teaching instruction, the teacher and students take turns leading the dialogue in order to enhance the students' comprehension-monitoring skills. The research on reciprocal teaching has included meta-analyses, group designs, qualitative designs, and single-subject research designs. These studies have identified gaps in the literature to include the measurement of treatment fidelity and treatment acceptability, as well as the psychometric properties of the instruments used to measure daily reading comprehension growth. These gaps were investigated in this study. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of reciprocal teaching comprehension-monitoring with a group of fifteen 3rd grade students reading at grade level. Specifically, this study investigated the use of curriculum-based measurement maze probes (CBM-maze probes) to formatively assess the reading comprehension growth of the students. Additionally, this study implemented treatment integrity procedures and investigated the acceptability of reciprocal teaching and the CBM-maze probes through a treatment acceptability rating scale. A multiple baseline across groups with three phases (baseline, intervention, follow-up) was employed. Overall, visual analysis of the data suggested reciprocal teaching was an effective intervention in increasing reading comprehension abilities in students as measured by the CBM-maze probes. All three groups exhibited continual growth on the daily comprehension measures across all three phases. Implications for practice, cautions in interpreting the results, and future directions are discussed.

The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of a direct instruction model as a means of enhancing secondary students' schema for expository text. Subjects were seventh- and tenth-grade students in regular reading and English classes in an suburban school district. Students were pre- and posttested on four measures: attitude toward expository text, independent reading comprehension and recall from expository text, organization of information from expository text in notetaking, and expository writing. A nested analysis of covariance procedure was used for data analysis to account for teacher effects and group non-equivalence. The study was conducted over a six-week period in the spring semester. A model of direct instruction in analysis of expository text structure was developed by the researcher, using sample text passages similar to those encountered by seventh- and tenth-grade students in content area reading. Treatment group teachers were provided with lesson plans and materials and were given instruction in the model; comparison group classes were given no particular instructional treatment other than that normally conducted during this period.

This study described the way teachers used questions with skilled and less skilled readers during reading instruction. The cognitive level and functions of questions were analyzed based on data collected through direct observation within the natural environment of the classroom. In addition, the patterns of questioning which included wait-time and sequencing of questions were identified and reported. Twenty sixth grade teachers randomly selected from a metropolitan school district were observed while instructing skilled readers and less skilled readers. Data collected during non-participatory observation of reading instruction through audiotape recordings, a low-inference observation instrument, and field notes were analyzed using the chisquare statistic, log-linear analysis, and descriptive statistics. Each question/response/response loop which occurred during the eighty observations was analyzed as to the cognitive level and function of the question, designation and wait-time of the student's response, the appropriateness, type, and length of the student's response, and the content of the teacher's response. Within the limitations of this study, the following conclusions have been formulated. 1. Teachers use different cognitive levels of questions for particular functions as dictated by the specific needs and characteristics of the students in the skill level. 2. Although teachers ask the majority of questions at the cognitive-memory and convergent levels rather than the higher divergent and evaluative levels among both skilled and less skilled readers, the primary function is that of extending. It appears that teachers use questions as a way of encouraging student participation during reading instruction. 3. Among both skilled and less skilled readers, teachers practice a fast pace approach to questioning, waiting an average of one to two seconds for a response. 4. Paths of sequence for question/response/response loops are similar for both skilled and less skilled reading groups. The function of extending typically followed focusing and clarifying, demonstrating the teacher's apparent effort to include as many students as possible during instruction.