Introduces a technique for comprehension assessment that allows teachers who have had only a moderate amount of training to develop tests that are valid, reliable, and interpretable. Notes that the procedure can be based on any text without an extended tryout and revision process. (FL)

Concludes that the test has basic problems in construction, interpretation, validity, and reliability. (FL)

The FRI and GORT tests are reviewed with attention to test rationales and purposes, test development, test administration, and making the purchase choice. Concludes that the FRI is the preferable test. (JK)

Offers a humorous look at some approaches to research in reading. (FL)

Concludes that valid reading tests are needed for adults and should be designed differently than tests for academic or school-related reading. (AEA)

Examines the extent and direction of curriculum bias in standardized reading achievement tests by comparing the relative overlap in the contents of five separate reading achievement tests with the content of seven commercial reading series. (HOD)

In conjunction with testing mandates, some states have developed new measures intended to reflect changes in thinking about reading. Discusses, in dialogue form, whether these new measures support educational improvement or limit them. (BJV)

Bringing structure to the reading assessment process, this paper presents a draft proposal of an assessment structure which practitioners can follow, one which can be applied systematically within the Instructional Support Team process across Pennsylvania. After some background information, the paper briefly discusses features of effective reading…

Despite widely-held beliefs to the contrary, three different sources of research data prove that children in the 1990s read better on the average than either their father's generation or their grandfather's generation. "Then and Now" studies indicate that students read better now than decades ago. Restandardization of test norms also…

Reading comprehension, viewed from a psycholinguistic perspective, is a process of mapping new information into existing knowledge structures and is similar to general thinking, reasoning, and problem solving. Reading comprehension is an active process--a dialogue between writer and reader--and an integration of the printed page and the reader's…

To her students at the University of Arizona, Ruth Strang emphasized the theme "look beyond." By that she meant to look beyond the mediocrity and routine that stiffles lives and be a creative reading teacher and diagnostician. Reading teachers, she maintained, should understand that reading comprehension requires the ability to read the…

The 1978 New York City Test Report indicates that forty-three percent of those tested in that year in the City's public schools are reading at or above grade level. These results, however, when summarized in this way, are meaningless. The graph prepared for this article traces the reading levels of the school system and its 32 districts for…

Notes the problem that comprehension questions that claim to assess students' skills in finding main ideas may in fact be measuring their knowledge of identifying the topic of a passage. (JC)

Notes the weakness of comprehension assessment as it occurs in standardized tests and exercise books, and reports on a new approach which views reading as a constructive process that results from a complex set of interactions between reader and texts. (NH)

Presents a historical overview of the introduction of the major reading comprehension assessments, showing that the predominant approaches were shaped by the prevailing educational measurement milieu and were implemented largely in response to public pressure. Argues in favor of a naturalistic reading comprehension assessment for evaluating those…