This study evaluated the effectiveness of a comprehension program integrated with social studies instruction designed for at-risk second graders. The program included instruction in cause-effect text structure, emphasizing clue words, generic questions, graphic organizers, and the close analysis of specially constructed cause-effect target…

This article is based on the presidential address I delivered at the 12th annual meeting of the Society for the Scientific Study of Reading, held in June 2005 in Toronto. I trace the development of my interest in instructional research in, first, beginning reading and, more recently, in comprehension, and I describe studies designed to improve the…

Findings of a seminar which explored the current linguistics methods of teaching elementary reading and examined the background of this approach and some programs constant with it are presented. The seminar established the following set of criteria for describing the important characteristics of a linguistics method: (1) task definitions of…

An instructional program designed to help middle school students with severe learning disabilities learn about story themes, and focused on enhancing ability to generalize to themes not included in the instruction, was evaluated. Findings indicate students with learning disabilities can profit from instruction geared toward abstract higher order…