In 2007, the New Zealand Ministry of Education formally recognized the condition of dyslexia for the first time and has subsequently developed a working definition of the condition. The aim of this article is to draw on contemporary theory and research on reading development, reading difficulties, and reading intervention to describe what the…

Fluent reading is essential for successful comprehension. One dimension of reading fluency is reading rate, or reading speed. Because of the importance of reading fluency, fluency development activities should be incorporated into classroom practice. One activity that meets the fluency development conditions proposed by Nation (2007) is speed…

Investigates why some middle school students appear to be good decoders but have problems with reading comprehension. Shows that their listening comprehension was no better than their reading comprehension, and thus rather than needing further instruction in decoding, they require assistance in developing their general language and listening…

Reports that the reading comprehension of 14- and 18-year-old students and the volume of reading done by students and adults ranks higher in New Zealand than in the United States or Iran. Suggests that levels of reading achievement for students depend on the reading demands of society. (AEA)

One of the key requirements of the Common Core State Standards for Reading is that all students must be able to comprehend texts of steadily increasing complexity as they progress through school. By the time they complete the core, students must be able to read and comprehend independently and proficiently the kinds of complex texts commonly found…

A New Zealand pilot study examined Tests of Reading Comprehension (TORCH) scores compared to PAT: Reading Comprehension scores and compared with teacher ratings. TORCH is a reading test package published in 1987 by the Australian Council for Educational Research. It consists of 14 untimed passages intended to assess the extent to which readers in…

Presents a study in which children with low reading comprehension were taught four study activities: summarizing, questioning, clarifying, and predicting. Instruction was by reciprocal teaching whereby an adult tutor and children alternately discussed the text. States that students' accuracy on comprehension tests increased significantly and was…

In this article, the author describes some of the possible components needed to develop multilevel theory that support the scaling of reading interventions. Scaling can be defined in a number of ways: depth, sustainability, spread, and shift (see Coburn, 2003). The author treats "scaling" in this paper as it has been traditionally…

Discusses a study in which four low-achieving 12-year-old readers were trained to tutor similar age low-achieving readers in reading comprehension strategies. States that both tutors and students learned to use the strategies effectively and that both groups made substantial gains in comprehension. (GEA)

Examines school and classroom factors that moderated gender and home language gaps in reading achievement of New Zealand students. Uses data from the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement survey to examine comprehension and word recognition scores of nine-year-olds. Shows that the magnitude of the gender gap and…

Argues that, in the high school classroom, it may appear that much is being learned, but in the minds of pupils there is often considerable confusion as to the meaning of what they have read. Reports on a study that explored the nature of that confusion and discusses what can be done. (RBW)

Reports on research from New Zealand showing that both teachers and students benefited from a concurrent interview technique in which teachers try to discover what their students understand, or fail to understand, from the material they read. (HOD)

Investigates the effects of verbal and pictorial advance organizers on science text comprehension of children with high or low prior knowledge. Finds that verbal advance organizers assist text comprehension of children with strong prior knowledge, while the addition of a pictorial component aids comprehension of children with weak prior knowledge.…

This volume presents the 53rd Yearbook of the National Reading Conference (NRC). The papers in this Yearbook reflect NRC's practice of pursuing not only traditionally important topics in literacy but also many issues that may not be deemed worthy of funding and government attention. Rather than a narrowing of the field, the submitted manuscripts,…