We focus here on the obstacles students face when learning to read in their second language, specifically in contexts where the second language is taught as a school subject or used as a medium of instruction (immersion). Qualitative studies in these areas have highlighted strategy deployment and approaches to constructing meaning as key variables…

The essays below were prepared following the LRA session organized by Janice Almasi entitled, "Examining the relative contributions of content knowledge and strategic processing to comprehension." What unites these essays are the personal and historical stances that each writer has taken; in addition, the essays are rich with…

This chapter first looks at Extensive Reading and Extensive Listening separately, highlighting the language learning benefits of the two approaches to language learning. It then discusses ways of implementing the two together in input-poor L2 contexts where the quantity and quality of the target language input tends to be severely limited. In…

Despite the fact that comprehension plays an important role in the reading process, the literature in a South African context reveals that learners continue to struggle with it and teachers continue to neglect it in their teaching. The literature has further shown that teachers' neglect of comprehension in their reading lessons could be attributed…

While elementary teachers encourage students to monitor their own reading and give them strategies to comprehend the text and build their vocabulary, middle school teachers stop modeling and encouraging these strategies but still expect that students are cognizant of metacognition and strategies. As a result, more students are entering college…

This 5-week case study research used qualitative methods to understand and study the relationship between feedback from course instructors and supervisors, and how it is used in comprehension instructional choices by eight pre-service teachers. The following research questions directed this research: (1) What is the role of feedback in pre-service…

In this collaborative self-study, two teacher educators examined transcripts of preservice teachers' inquiry groups focused on assessment and tutoring of struggling readers as part of a reading methods course. The analysis identified instances of scaffolding by the course instructor that influenced preservice teachers' development. Types of…

Skill and drill remediation in developmental reading courses do not prepare students for reading tasks in future college-level courses. When a skill and drill model is replaced with a model that utilizes contextualization, students engage in relevant activities with authentic texts to prepare students for college-level activities. The reading…

Recent research shows that reading comprehension relies heavily on prior knowledge. Far more than generic "reading skills" like drawing inferences, making predictions, and knowing the function of subheads, how well students learn from a nonfiction text depends on their background knowledge of the text's subject matter. And in a cyclical…

In this article, a social studies teacher and a literacy teacher describe a vision for social studies that highlights reading practices that foster disciplinary literacy in elementary geography. Their purpose is to share a practical approach for enriching elementary social studies lessons and activities with a geographic lens. During the…

Learning science is language intensive. Students might have to interpret the meaning of models, support claims with evidence, communicate arguments, and discuss phenomena and scientific principles. For English Language Learners (ELLs), engaging in scientific and engineering practices includes additional challenges. This article describes a series…

Across the world, development of health literacy skills with elementary school students improves health outcomes, reduces health risks, and increases academic success. As elementary school classroom teachers are often responsible for delivering the health curriculum to their students, this article examines ways to integrate health literacy with…

The purpose of this article is twofold: (a) to describe a structured literature review that was completed to determine how reading comprehension instruction has been studied with high-functioning children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and (b) to provide insight into the reading strategies that teachers might use to support these children.…

The purpose of this intervention study was to examine the use of a metacognitive strategy--the Comprehension, Check, and Repair Strategy--on strategic reading behavior, nonstrategic reading behavior, and reading comprehension of students who are deaf or hard of hearing (D/HH). A multiple baseline design was used across 3 teacher-student dyads.…

This study describes an intervention that uses morphology to support word learning within comprehension instruction of content-specific texts. The intervention is detailed such that the morphological understandings used to support word choice and word learning activities are clear and can be replicated by researchers and educators. Six main…