Enhancing Reading Comprehension Skill in Children fromSchools ofDifferentSocio-Economic Status

LILIANA FONSECA; BÁRBARA GOTTHEIL; ADRIANA ALDREY; MARÍA PUJALS; JUAN PABLO BARREYRO; INÉS LAGOMARSINO; ELEONORA LASALA; SANDRA MOLINA; LUCIANA BOUSANTI; DOLORES PUYRREDON; LETICIA FREIRE; ALEJANDRA MENDIVELZUA; MARA MUÑIZ; GRACIELA MIGLIARDO

Montréal

Congreso; 19th Annual Meeting Society for the Scientific Study of Reading; 2012

Society for the Scientific Study of Reading

Texts are an important tool for learning. Students need to construct meaning from texts requiring strategies that link background knowledge with information found in them. Most readers need instruction on different strategies to improve their comprehension skills but it becomes indispensable and effective for students that are struggling most (McNamara D. 2004, 2007). Ineffectual readers may come from underprivileged environments with poor oral language, emergent literacy skills, and limited prior knowledge. Purpose: to investigate the effects of an instructional program in Spanish based on explicit reading comprehension strategy teaching, in schools of different socio-economic status (SES). This program focuses on vocabulary, inference generation, text structure and monitoring (Oakhill, 2006, 2010, 2011). Method Participants: A hundred children (40 controls and 60 interventions, between 9-12.) from two different schools (middle and low SES) participated in the study. . Design: pretest, instruction period, two 80-minute weekly sessions during 8 weeks, post test. Results: Pretest showed no statistical difference between control and intervention group in verbal reasoning, verbal comprehension (WISC III), non verbal reasoning (Raven), Word and Pseudo-word Reading (LEE), Reading comprehension (LEE). Post-test: An analysis of variance was carried out and an interaction effect was found in Vocabulary (Wisc III), LEE Test, CLP, and Monitoring (experimental test) between each intervention group and its control. Pretest and post-test measures indicated significant differences in the intervention group (but not in the control group) in: vocabulary, reading comprehension (LEE and CLP), inferences (connective and elaborative), and monitoring. This intervention clearly results in a significant improvement in reading comprehension in different SES groups.