Description:

Purpose: The National Assessment of Educational Progress indicates that 33 percent of 4th graders and 26 percent of 8th graders read below a basic proficiency level. Further, research indicates that 80 percent of students with learning disabilities have severe reading difficulties. Late elementary school, when comprehension of more challenging content is required, is a time when some students first begin to develop reading difficulties. Therefore, this project focuses on addressing this problem in fourth grade.

The purpose of this project is to develop one or more interventions to improve reading comprehension for students at risk for or identified as having a reading-related disability. By applying cognitive theory to the practice of education, the intervention(s) will use a questioning approach to help build a coherent representation of narrative and expository text. The research will examine intervention effectiveness of two types of questioning (causal and general) on two potential subgroups of struggling readers—those who simply paraphrase with few inferences and those who make many inaccurate inferences. The project will investigate which interventions are feasible and promising for whom, and identify instructional conditions that optimize student responsiveness.

Project Activities: The research team will use an iterative process to develop an intervention(s) aimed at improving reading comprehension for students with or at risk for a reading disability. In Phase I, texts and intervention materials and procedures will be selected. Type (causal versus generic) and timing (online versus offline) of questioning will be examined through a pilot study, and researchers will investigate whether different subgroups of struggling readers respond differently to these approaches. If no subgroups emerge, one intervention will be developed. In Phase II, an additional pilot study will systematically modify the intervention to identify intensity variables (e.g., amount of modeling, frequency, duration) that optimize student responsiveness to intervention. In Phase III, a final pilot study will test the feasibility and promise of the intervention(s) when implemented by school personnel.

Products: The project will result in one or more questioning interventions aimed at improving the reading comprehension of students with or at risk of having a reading disability. The expected outcomes of the study also include published reports and presentations on the feasibility and promise of the intervention(s).

Structured Abstract

Setting: The project will take place in fourth grade classrooms in two school districts within the Twin Cities area of Minnesota.

Population: Students who are screened for potential reading disabilities (those who score in the bottom quartile of comprehension but without decoding problems) will be invited to join the study, with approximately 66 students expected to participate. Based on a think-aloud procedure, participating students will be classified as Elaborators (readers who attempt inferences but often inaccurate ones) and Paraphrasers (readers who tend to paraphrase verbatim without making inferences). For the final pilot test, 16 fourth grade teachers and up to 16 special education teachers and other support staff will participate with their students. There will also be a small subset (8–10 students) of non-struggling readers.

Intervention: The intervention uses a questioning approach designed to help readers build a coherent representation of narrative and expository text. The approach will coach students to ask questions that help them identify essential connections between parts of text to enhance comprehension. This project will iteratively develop the intervention(s) by identifying components that contribute to the feasibility and promise of the intervention. Type (causal versus generic) and timing (online versus offline) of questioning will be examined. Further, the researchers will investigate whether different subgroups of struggling readers respond differently and whether different intensities of the intervention optimize responsiveness.

Research Design and Methods: An iterative, mixed methods approach will be employed. Feedback from discourse and intervention experts, teachers, tutors (who implement the intervention in the first phases), and students; researcher observations; and student outcomes will be measured to identify the intervention(s) that is (are) both feasible for school-based implementation and promising for improving reading comprehension.

Control Condition: The control group in the final pilot study will have a "business as usual" learning experience.

Key Measures: Struggling readers will be screened using the Gates-MacGinitie Reading Test (GMRT) comprehension subtest and the Curriculum-based Measurement (CBM) oral reading and maze tasks. These participants will be classified into subgroups of struggling readers (Elaborators and Paraphrasers) using a think-aloud protocol. Feasibility measures include questionnaires to elicit feedback from experts, teachers, tutors, and students; focus group discussions to elicit feedback from teachers; and observation checklists to be used by researchers. Student outcome measures include tests of oral reading, reading comprehension, verbal recall of text, and sentence verification (inference-generating skill). Further, the impact of additional skills (decoding, vocabulary, and world knowledge) on response to intervention will be measured using subtests of the Woodcock-Johnson Tests of Achievement–III. In the final year, distal measures of reading comprehension will include the GMRT, CBM Maze, and Comprehensive Reading Assessment Battery.

Data Analytic Strategy: Cluster analysis will be used to identify which children belong to each subgroup of struggling readers. To analyze feasibility, feedback and observation data will be categorized by common theme, and the results will be systematically used to inform the next iteration of intervention(s). To analyze the promise of the intervention(s), student outcome data will be examined using analysis of variance.

Products and Publications

Book chapter

McMaster, K.L., and Espin, C.A. (in press). Reading Comprehension Instruction and Intervention: Promoting Inference Making. In D. Compton, R. Partial, and K. Cain (Eds.), Theories of Reading Development. Amsterdam: John Benjamin's Publishing.

Van den Broek, P., Espin, C.A., McMaster, K., and Helder, A. (in press). Developing Reading Comprehension Skills: Perspectives From Theory and Practice. In E. Segers, and P. van den Broek (Eds.), Continuities in Language and Literacy Development. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Journal article, monograph, or newsletter

McMaster, K.L., Espin, C.A., and van den Broek, P. (2014). Making Connections: Linking Cognitive Psychology and Intervention Research to Improve Comprehension of Struggling Readers. Learning Disabilities Research and Practice, 29(1): 17–24. doi:10.1111/ldrp.12026

McMaster, K.L., Espin, C.A., and van den Broek, P. (2014). Making Connections: Linking Cognitive Science and Intervention Research to Improve Comprehension of Struggling Readers. Learning Disabilities Research and Practice, 29: 17–24.

McMaster, K.L., van den Broek, P., Espin, C.A., Pinto, V., Janda, B., Lam, E.A., Hsu, H., Jung, P., van Boekel, M., and Bethel, A. (2014). Developing a Reading Comprehension Intervention: Translating Cognitive Theory to Educational Practice. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 40: 28–40. doi:10.1016/j.cedpsych.2014.04.001

McMaster, K.L., van den Broek, P., Espin, C.A., Pinto, V., Janda, B., Lam, E.A., Hsua, H.-C., Junga, P.-G., Leinena, A.B., and van Boekela, M. (2015). Developing a Reading Comprehension Intervention: Translating Cognitive Theory to Educational Practice. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 40: 28–40. doi:10.1016/j.cedpsych.2014.04.001