Reading comprehension emerges as an important skill set in the early elementary grades. It is supported by component skills including
decoding, linguistic knowledge including vocabulary and syntactic knowledge, as well as more complex, higher-level components such as
inference making and comprehension monitoring. Theoretical understanding of reading comprehension has historically included reader-focused
models, as well as models that include reader-text interaction and text-task interaction. Together, the dimensions of reader, text, and task
represent the conceptual space in which comprehension can occur. Using a crossed random-effects model, the probability of a correct item
response can be modeled as a function of reader, text, and item characteristics. This approach has been used in several studies of reading
comprehension, with informative results. However, to date this work has focused on older readers, or has used relatively small samples of
readers. In this study, a crossed random-effects modeling approach was used to analyze a large data set consisting of item response data from
a sample of 2,723 Grade 3 students. Student-level predictors of vocabulary knowledge, syntactic knowledge, and word recognition, as well as
several categorizations of item type, and passage-level predictors of lexile and several indices of passage complexity were found to be
significant predictors of reading comprehension. Cross-level interactions were investigated, and significant interactions were found between
student and item predictors, and between student and passage predictors. Approximately 50% of variance in reading comprehension across
students was explained by the student-level predictors, but only 18-22% of variance across items was explained by the passage-level and
item-level predictors. Results from this study suggest that for Grade 3 readers, the strong predictive relations between student predictors
of syntactic and vocabulary knowledge to reading comprehension may be moderated by some aspects of item and task demands. However, for this
large-scale, multiple choice assessment of reading comprehension, variability in items and passages was largely unexplained. Results are
discussed in the context of theoretical accounts of reading comprehension, from which the item and passage predictors are derived. / A Dissertation submitted to the School of Communication Science and Disorders in partial fulfillment of the
requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Summer Semester 2017. / July 26, 2017. / Florida Assessments for Instruction in Reading, grade three, item response modeling, multilevel modeling,
reader-text interactions, reading comprehension / Includes bibliographical references. / Hugh W. Catts, Professor Directing Dissertation; Christopher Schatschneider, University Representative;
Carla Wood, Committee Member; Donald Compton, Committee Member.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_604992 |
| Contributors | McIlraith, Autumn Lorayne (author), Catts, Hugh W. (Hugh William), 1949- (professor directing dissertation), Schatschneider, Christopher (university representative), Wood, Carla (committee member), Compton, Donald L., 1960- (committee member), Florida State University (degree granting institution), College of Communication and Information (degree granting college), School of Communication Science and Disorders (degree granting departmentdgg) |
| Publisher | Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English, English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, text, doctoral thesis |
| Format | 1 online resource (92 pages), computer, application/pdf |
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