Purpose: In this discussion as part of a response to Catts and Kamhi's "Prologue: Reading Comprehension Is Not a Single Activity" (2017), the authors provide selected examples from 4th-, 5th-, and 6th-grade texts to demonstrate, in agreement with Catts and Kamhi, that reading comprehension is a multifaceted and complex ability. The…

Reader response, simulation, and assimilation theories offer insights to our emotional connections with characters. Findings from a study conducted with avid fourth-grade readers show that when the children feel they are next to the character, they acentrally imagine the narrative and experience sympathy. The children also participate and…

Through their study of classroom talk about and around literary text, the authors discovered that their application of Rosenblatt's (1938/1995, 1978) "aesthetic" stance to elementary (primarily Grades 4-6) students' affective responses to literary text uniformly lacked the simultaneous articulation of "the real impact between the…

This study examined the motivation to read of children in grades two through six. All children in the study were strong in their literal comprehension of narrative text. Some were equally strong in their ability to respond thoughtfully to the text (Blue Group); others struggled to respond to questions requiring them to think about the implications…

In this article, the author explores how a group of ten fourth-grade students who were avid readers became a community of inquiry. The primary goal of this study was to document the children's reading engagement: how they created, entered, and sustained the world of the story. This article also reflects the impact of three elements--data…

This study involved fourth grade children as co-researchers of their engaged, aesthetic reading experience. As members of the "Readers as Researchers Club," they documented their engagement with text--how they create, enter, and sustain the story world. The children, who self-identified as avid readers, explored the activities central to their…