Using a correlational research design, this dissertation sought to examine the variables--self-efficacy, motivation, reading attitude, and gender--which could serve as a predictors for reading achievement with a purposive sample of 81 African-American 5th grade males attending two elementary schools in North Texas. Using a bivariate correlation,…

In 1996 President Clinton established the America Reads Challenge Act (1997), which included a commitment that every child will read independently and well by the end of third grade. This initiative was predicated on links between achievement and poverty (Riley, 1996, 2002) and that children reading below grade level in the early grades perform…