With PQDT Open, you can read the full text of open access dissertations and theses free of charge.
About PQDT Open
Search
Students in the United States struggle with comprehension when reading, especially when reading expository text. Research has shown that good readers are strategic readers and comprehension strategies can be taught to all students. Yet many observational studies have found very little comprehension instruction occurring in elementary classrooms. This study was designed to identify the amount of time teachers in the United States and other English-speaking countries ask students to use comprehension strategies identified in the 2016 PIRLS Teacher Questionnaire. This researcher hoped to find out how often fourth-grade teachers teach comprehension strategies necessary for comprehending narrative and expository texts and whether a relationship exists between the teaching of comprehension strategies and reading expository test scores on PIRLS for fourth-grade students in the United States and other English-speaking countries By using the data collected during the 2016 PIRLS administration on the Teacher Questionnaire, a frequency distribution was run for the United States, Ireland, Northern Ireland, England, Australia, and Trinidad and Tobago. A regression analysis was run to compare the frequency of comprehension strategy use and fourth-grade student scores on the expository test section. Results showed a small relationship between the comprehension strategy “locate information within the text” and expository test scores for all English-speaking countries. Negative relationships were found with the strategies “make predictions about what will happen next in the text they are reading” and “describe the style or structure of the text they have read.” The results indicate that more teachers are teaching comprehension strategies with “locate information within the text” contributing to student comprehension when reading expository text. The comprehension strategies “make predictions about what will happen next in the text they are reading” and “describe the style or structure of the text they have read” indicated a significant negative relationship, which may have resulted from incorrect teacher instruction of the strategies or students’ inability to know when, why, and how to apply those strategies when reading nonfiction text.
Advisor: | Martin, Dawn Jacobs |
Commitee: | Fenster, Mark |
School: | Notre Dame of Maryland University |
Department: | Department of Education |
School Location: | United States -- Maryland |
Source: | DAI-A 81/3(E), Dissertation Abstracts International |
Source Type: | DISSERTATION |
Subjects: | Reading instruction, Elementary education |
Keywords: | Comprehension, Instruction, PIRLS, Reading, Strategies |
Publication Number: | 13901379 |
ISBN: | 9781085798495 |