Thesis (Ph.D.)--Lehigh University, 2009. / Adviser: Edward S. Shapiro.

First, this study investigated whether the modality in which stories are presented to children affects their reasoning ability. Secondly, it inquired if children process spatial, causal, or consequential stories differently. It compared children's verbatim memory with their ability to draw inferences for three types of stories. Each child was presented with the stories either in pictures, in words, or in a combination of pictures and words. The results show that supporting a verbal presentation with images significantly increases understanding of causal and consequential stories. But, for all types of stories, all children drew significantly more correct inferences when the narrative sequences were presented to them verbally than when they were presented in pictures. Also, the results show that children perform differently on spatial stories than they do linear stories.

<p> This particularistic qualitative case study design examined reading strategies, approaches, and resources teachers of ELL students in kindergarten through third grade use to support reading development and promote the home to school connection regarding literacy proficiency. The purpose of this study was to examine strategies, resources, and approaches used to support home-to-school partnerships focused on reading development of K-3 ELLs in the X Public School District. Data analysis resulted in six emergent themes consisting of 22 teacher interviews. The first finding in this study that was revealed through teacher interviews identified guided reading, visual aides, reader&rsquo;s theater, and modeling/oral reading fluency as strategies that contribute to ELLs reading proficiency. In the second finding, teachers identified inviting parents to volunteer in the classroom, sending home a reading log that helps track the students&rsquo; reading at home, and inviting parent participation in extracurricular activities as approaches to encourage partnerships regarding reading development of ELLs. The results of this study provided recommendations for educational leaders to provide teachers specific professional development to encourage parent participation to focus on increasing students&rsquo; reading development that is tailored to the students&rsquo; and caregivers&rsquo; language needs. For future research, it is recommended that the study be replicated using different school districts to determine if similar findings were consistent across different districts.</p>

This thesis explores links between the fields of literacy and drama in education for the elementary whole-language classroom. In her transactional theory of reading, Louise Rosenblatt has provided a theory regarding students' transactions with text, and the exploration of ideas and impressions generated during a reading event. This thesis extends Rosenblatt's theory into the uses of drama in the learning process. Marjorie Siegel propels the notion of transmediation in education. Students should be encouraged to generate and express meanings gathered in reading across multiple sign systems. As a meeting place for many language-based and nonlinguistic sign systems, drama provides an ideal place for transmediation to occur. Several drama strategies, advocated by Dorothy Heathcote, Brian Edmiston, David Booth, and others, are introduced. Finally, two drama systems, story drama and narrative theatre, are introduced to show how drama, when linked to the curriculum, can generate rich and layered learning experiences.

<p> The purpose of this mixed-methods study was to determine if the literacy intervention program for reluctant readers in one middle school was effective as measured by an increase in student reading scores measured by the Student Reading Inventory Assessment. I investigated perceptions of 100 students and 28 teachers regarding the literacy intervention program through the use of district-administered surveys. I also interviewed eight teachers regarding their delivery of the literacy interventions in the classroom setting.</p><p> The literacy intervention program targeted the population of students identified as reluctant readers who were not already receiving any reading intervention, but were reading below grade level. The study investigated whether or not the intervention contributed to an increase in student reading abilities with 44 students who read 0 to 6 months below grade level, as measured by the Student Reading Inventory Assessment. The study also investigated eight teachers' opinions of professional development that was implemented in 2014-2015 that focused on literacy instruction across all content areas, other than English Language Arts.</p>

<p> The purpose of this study was to determine what instructional strategies expert teachers of English language learners (ELLs) in the primary grades perceive as most effective for teaching reading to ELLs. Another purpose of this study was to determine what expert teachers of ELLs in the primary grades perceive as the barriers to the reading achievement of English learners. The final purpose of this study was to determine what strategies expert teachers of ELLs in the primary grades recommend to overcome perceived barriers. Quantitative data were collected from effective teachers who taught primary grades in Riverside County, California, using an electronic format. The effective teachers were identified based on teaching at a school with an API of 800 or more with an ELL population of 40% or more and based on data criteria. Effective teachers in the primary grades were chosen based on student achievement, Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS) assessments, and site principal recommendations. A Likert scale was used for the survey. The effective teachers ranked effective instructional strategies in the five components of reading and had the ability to insert additional instructional strategies, barriers, and ways they overcame barriers in an open-ended question on the survey. The findings indicated the participants found the instructional strategies for teaching the five components of reading to be effective to teach ELLs in the primary grades to read. Based on the data analyzed, all teachers in the primary grades should be knowledgeable in the five components of reading as well as the effective instructional strategies for implementation. In addition to ensuring that teacher preparation programs and all current teachers in Grades K-3 are prepared for teaching reading to ELLs in the primary grades, this researcher also recommends that the leaders at the sites be well-versed in the five components of reading and effective instructional strategies. Additional research is recommended to identify leadership trends at the successful schools, such as accountability, data used to guide instruction, staff development planning, and student intervention programs.</p>

The focus of investigation in this study was the online reading behavior of intermediate learners of French as they read a hypertext with L1 and L2 lexical glosses and their comprehension. By design, access to the L2 translations was constrained by access to the L1 gloss information first. This prescribed path of support was meant to maximize target language input, and to prompt cognitive and metacognitive processes toward the goal of increased comprehension. Comprehension was measured through multiple choice and recall tasks, and questionnaires were used to gather demographic data and learner perceptual variables. The study provides evidence that comprehension is increased with access to the hypertext glosses among readers who accessed both French and English language glosses, regardless of prior ability. Accessing only French glosses was not linked to greater comprehension, and no access to glosses reduced a comprehension factor score. Prior ability, as measured by a standardized FL placement exam, was not related to gloss access or time on task. L2 readers' preference for L1 language glosses in also reaffirmed to some extent, though French language glosses seem to have some appeal. Gender also played a role in the extent to which the text was enjoyed by L2 readers, and there is suggestive evidence for the roles of background schema and formal schema based on a qualitative analysis of recall. Questionnaire data reveal insights on readers' perceptions of FLL, reading, their abilities, and reading online, findings which are related in a variety of ways to other factors in this study. Pedagogical implications are considered, as well as directions for future research.

This study was designed to validate multiple dimensions of reading motivation and to examine how students with learning/reading disabilities (LRD) differed along these dimensions from non-LRD, same-aged peers. A sample of fourth and fifth grade students completed the Motivation for Reading Questionnaire (MRQ; Wigfield & Guthrie, 1997), a questionnaire designed to assess 11 possible dimensions of reading motivation, including self-efficacy, intrinsic and extrinsic motives for reading, goals for reading, and social aspects of reading. Confirmatory factor analysis, analysis of covariance, and discriminant analysis were employed to demonstrate that the proposed dimensions of reading motivation could be identified, measured reliably, and could discriminate between cohorts of students. Several of the scales were positively related to one another. Scale score means on some of the dimensions differed by grade and LRD status, fourth graders reported stronger motivation than fifth graders, non-LRD reported stronger motivation in Self-Efficacy and Challenge, while LRD students reported stronger motivation in Compliance. Scale score means on most of the dimensions were similar by gender and ethnicity regardless of LRD status. Eight of the 11 scales related to children's report of reading activity. Discriminant analysis revealed three dimensions discriminating between students with and without LRD. This study confirms that reading motivation is multidimensional and should be considered when conducting research and practice.

A contributing factor to children's lack of reading achievement in school is that there may be ineffective or no early literacy intervention programs at their school. A review of literature suggests that early literacy intervention is beneficial to help children be successful in school. This teacher-as-researcher study was designed to investigate six years of the development of the Reading Discovery program and to describe the process of reflecting on my practice and analyzing my results in order to improve my early literacy program, students' literacy, and teachers' literacy instruction. The instruments I used to assess student literacy were from Marie Clay's Observation Survey or my adaptations of them, consisting of letter identification, a word test, concepts about print, writing vocabulary, dictation, and text reading. My study included 324 first-grade students from two elementary schools, where I was a reading specialist over the last six years. There were 170 children who participated in the Reading Discovery Program. This program was enhanced by the assistance of 17 literacy volunteers. During the study, 145 children, identified as being at-risk, graduated from Reading Discovery. The longitudinal data showed that only three of the students who graduated from the program needed further reading intervention. Unlike some remedial programs, the children in this program spent 90% of their time actually reading and writing real texts. The rest of the time was spent reflecting on their work, doing word analysis, and taking care of bookkeeping. In conclusion, the Reading Discovery program had a positive effect on the literacy achievement of the participating first-grade children. Even those children not in the program benefited, because I provided their classroom teachers with instructional support, in-service training, and assessment data on every first-grade child. In addition, primary grade children regularly checked out appropriately leveled books from my library. As a result of this study, I have increased the number of students who participated in the program by providing individualized instruction, by using trained literacy volunteers, and by selecting the appropriate time for instruction. Reading Discovery program has significantly increased the number of children who can read and write without future remediation.

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to explore how five middle school students used humor in young adult literature as a vehicle for understanding according to Louise Rosenblatt's transactional reading theory. The study was conducted in an honors language arts classroom in the Southwestern region of the United States. Methods for data collection included twenty semi-structured interviews, observational fieldnotes, transcripts of audiotaped and videotaped literature circle discussions, journal entries, a humor survey and other miscellaneous written artifacts. Data were collected for seven months. Instructional materials included a variety of young adult novels and short stories representing historical fiction and contemporary realistic fiction genres. Analytic induction, constant comparison, organizational charts, and various forms of member checking were used to analyze the data. The results of the study indicate that the students used humor to construct meaning while reading. Specifically, students visualized action humor in the texts enhancing their comprehension. Discussions referencing experiential and textual connections were commonplace. Some students found humor in the use of archaic language or the use of dialects different from their own. The students read the adolescent literature both efferently and aesthetically (Rosenblatt, 1995) as they attended to humor setting conditions for engaging the humor. First, if the humor was the result of superiority humor where the focus group members could predict the targeted character would be hurt, disappointed or promote a negative change in the character's development, then they would not engage in the humor. Second, if the humor was closely related to their world of understanding, then the humor was embraced only after careful deliberation. Third, if the characters presented themselves as resilient and unaffected by the humor, then the students were willing to laugh at the characters.