Students' Concepts of Reading and Their Achievement in Reading Comprehension
Worley, Carolyn Juergensmeyer
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Permalink
https://hdl.handle.net/2142/66067
Description
Title
Students' Concepts of Reading and Their Achievement in Reading Comprehension
Author(s)
Worley, Carolyn Juergensmeyer
Issue Date
1981
Department of Study
Education
Discipline
Education
Degree Granting Institution
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Degree Name
Educat.D.
Degree Level
Dissertation
Keyword(s)
Education, Elementary
Language
eng
Abstract
A major purpose of this study was to determine if a difference, independent of intelligence, exists between the reading comprehension of elementary school students who have more adequate concepts of reading and students who have less adequate concepts of reading. The achievement of this purpose was guided by the following research questions: (1) Do second grade students who have more adequate concepts of reading have higher comprehension achievement, as measured by reading comprehension subtest scores, than second grade students with similar IQs who have less adequate concepts of reading? (2) Do fifth grade students who have more adequate concepts of reading have higher comprehension achievement, as measured by reading comprehension subtest scores, than fifth grade students with similar IQs who have less adequate concepts of reading? (3) Is there a relationship between the degree of adequacy of students concepts of reading and grade level?
Procedure. Three twenty minute individual interviews were conducted by the researcher with twenty second grade and twenty fifth grade students to assess their concepts of reading. Each interview was guided by a questionnaire. The first questionnaire consisted of open ended reading concept questions; the second consisted of text samples and specific reading concept questions related to the text samples, and the third questionnaire consisted of workbook exercises and specific reading concept questions related to the particular workbook item. The student's responses to selected questionnaire items were considered to reflect a "more adequate concept of reading" if they included one or more references to comprehension.
Results. A difference was found between the reading comprehension of elementary school students who have more adequate concepts of reading and students with similar IQs who have less adequate concepts of reading. This difference was significant at the .05 level in four of six analyses for second grade students and in six of six analyses for fifth grade students. For second grade students this difference was significant when adequacy of reading concept was assessed by responses to Questionnaire 2, Definitions of Reading in Reaction to Reading Specific Texts, or by a total score based on responses to all three questionnaires. For fifth grade students this difference was significant when adequacy of reading concept was assessed by responses to "What is reading?" (Questionnaire 1), by responses to Questionnaire 2, or by a total score based on responses to all three questionnaires. In all cases the analysis of covariance results were supported by the partial correlations.
The relationship between the degree of adequacy of students' concepts of reading and grade level was found to be significant by one of three chi-square tests and by two of three t tests. When reading concept adequacy was assessed by responses to Questionnaire 1, chi-square results and t-test results were significant. When reading concept adequacy was assessed by responses to all three questionnaires, t-test results were significant.
Conclusions. There is a difference, independent of intelligence, between the reading comprehension of elementary school students who have more adequate concepts of reading and students who have less adequate concepts of reading. The data partially support the first and third conclusions and fully support the second conclusion: (1) Second grade students who have more adequate concepts of reading have higher reading comprehension than second grade students with similar IQs who have less adequate concepts of reading. (2) Fifth grade students who have more adequate concepts of reading have higher reading comprehension than fifth grade students with similar IQs who have less adequate concepts of reading. (3) There is a relationship between the degree of adequacy of students' concepts of reading and grade level.
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