Finds that (1) exposure to correctly spelled words improved spelling accuracy for immediate and delayed posttests; (2) exposure to misspelled words did not significantly affect the spelling accuracy of the sample as a whole; and (3) no interaction was found between spelling ability and spelling accuracy improvement as the result of proofreading…

Examines the effect of self-instruction on error detection in short essays. Finds that above average readers in the self-instruction group performed significantly better than those in a control group, and that average readers displayed a similar but not statistically significant trend. (RS)

In order to investigate differences between the comprehension of high or low imagery passages of long or short length, a study analyzed the reading comprehension of fifth grade pupils (all reading at grade level). Thirty subjects read 16 passages each: four high imagery/short; four high imagery/long; four low imagery/short; and four low…

Examines the effects of 2 levels of prior knowledge and 2 types of text structure on the recall and question performance of 90 fifth graders who were average readers. Finds that prior knowledge has a greater effect on question performance than on recall performance and that it only enhances the recall of one section of the text information. (MG)

The effects of subject-generated and experimenter-provided verbal and pictorial elaboration on memory of prose were investigated in a sample of 192 fifth-grade pupils. Based on scores obtained from standardized reading tests, pupils were divided into those above, and those below, grade level. Each child read a social studies textbook passage under…

Examines the effect of self-instruction training on comprehension monitoring of below-average and above-average readers. Finds that self-instruction aided both groups of students in recognizing between-sentence contradictions and that below-average readers performed as well as above-average readers on transfer measures. (RS)

Examines children's responses to nine works of realistic literature and film. Finds (1) between-text differences for stance and understanding; (2) book and film differences for stance but not for understanding; (3) most responses were written from an aesthetic stance; and (4) the use of an aesthetic stance is associated with significantly higher…

A study investigated the effects of systematically varying the vocabulary-related instructions that students receive before reading to further understanding of the vocabulary/comprehension relationship. Subjects were 299 students from fifth- or fourth/fifth-grade classrooms, who participated in 6 different conditions which included reading…

A study determined the effect of parental involvement on reading achievement of participating students. Subjects were 22 fifth-grade students in a Chicago public school who received parental involvement and 19 students in the same school who did not receive parental involvement. Subjects' scores on the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills were used in the…

Examines the effects of reading comprehension ability and the presence of explicit or implicit causal relationships upon recall of propositional content and comprehension of interpropositional relationships. Finds that, in the late elementary grades, better readers begin to develop a strategy for the processing of written text which involves…

Finds (1) significant increase in reading rate and comprehension as the number of repeated reading increased; (2) students trained to segment sentences read faster and scored higher in comprehension than students given intonation training but not to a statistically significant degree; and (3) no interaction between repeated readings and…

Discusses research the author undertook with a class of fifth graders, in which they read and discussed popular series books. Shares examples of their talk about the topic and what that talk reveals about the potential of the classroom as a space to reveal, complicate, and challenge gendered assumptions about what is desirable or appropriate…

A study assessed dimensions of children's reading motivations by giving them a revised version of the Motivations for Reading Questionnaire (MRQ). The MRQ is designed to assess 11 possible dimensions of reading motivations, including reading efficacy, several intrinsic and several extrinsic reading motivations, social aspects of reading, and the…

Fifty-nine fifth-grade students were asked to use an unfamiliar textbook on a familiar topic to locate the answers to three questions, all of which contained terms that could be found in the book's index. As an analysis of covariance indicated, those who were asked guiding questions before and during their search were more successful in locating…

Finds that Japanese fifth graders' naming speed was a good indicator of the automaticity of the lexical access for both syllabaries and morphograms, but that skilled/less-skilled differences in vocalization latencies were greater for real words than for pseudowords for both hiragana and kanji. Discusses the applicability of C. A. Perfetti's verbal…