Abstract
Reading achievement depends in part on children's ability to employ strategies to monitor their comprehension, that is on children's use of metacognitive skills. An experimental intervention program created to foster such skills was evaluated. The story grammar training was designed to increase both strategic reading behavior and explicit, observable comprehension monitoring. Fourth-grade (N = 20) and fifth-grade (N = 16) children were randomly assigned to experimental and control groups. Maintenance was examined using free and probed oral recall, notetaking, and summarization of brief narrative and expository texts. Generalization was assessed through free and probed written recall of a lengthy text, which required both strategic reading and summarization skills for adequate comprehension. Skill acquisition was clearly demonstrated; trained readers were able to recall and summarize passages better than untrained readers. The evidence for generalization was more equivocal: although trained readers' free recall was significantly better than that of untrained readers, their probed recall was not. Provision of metacognitive skills that promote active comprehension monitoring, then, appears to provide children with the tools needed for independent reading. Programs designed to provide such skills may aid efforts to prevent reading failure.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Baker, L., & Brown, A. L. (1984). Metacognitive skills of reading. In D. Pearson, R. Barr, M. Kamil, & P. Mosenthal (Eds.),Handbook of reading research (pp. 353–394). New York: Longmans.
Bransford, J. D., Shelton, T. S., Stein, B. S., & Owings, R. A. (1980). Cognition and adaptation: The importance of learning to learn. In G. Harvey (Ed.),Cognition, social behavior and the environment (pp. 93–110). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
Brown, A. L. (1980). Metacognitive development and reading. In R. J. Spiro, B. Bruce, & W. F. Brewer (Eds.),Theoretical issues in reading comprehension (pp. 453–481). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
Brown, A. L., Bransford, J. D., Ferrara, R. A., & Campione, J. C. (1983). Learning, remembering, and understanding. In P. H. Mussen (Ed.),Handbook of Child Psychology (Vol. 3, pp. 77–166), New York: John Wiley & Sons.
Brown, A. L., & Smiley, S. S. (1978). The development of strategies for studying tests.Child Development, 49, 1076–1088.
Capelli, C. A., & Markman, E. M. (1982). Suggestions for training comprehension monitoring.Topics in Learning and Learning Disabilities, 2, 87–96.
Carnine, D., & Kinder, B. D. (1985). Teaching low-performing students to apply generative and schema strategies to narrative and expository material.Remedial and Special Education, 6, 20–30.
Day, J. D. (1981, April).Teaching summarization skills: A comparison of training methods. Paper presented at the Biennial Meeting of the Society for Research in Child Development, Boston, MA.
Dimino, J., Gersten, R., Carnine, D., & Blake, G. (1990). Story grammar: An approach for promoting at-risk secondary students' comprehension of literature.Elementary School Journal, 91, 19–32.
Doehring, D. G., Trites, R. L., Patel, P. G., & Friedorowicz, C. A. M. (1981).Reading disabilities: The interaction of reading, language, and neuropsychological deficits. New York: Academic Press.
Edwards, D. L. (1977).Concept of reading. Oxford, Ohio: A Learning Program Design Inc.
Evans, K. S., & Bruning, R. H. (in press). Children's ability to transfer knowledge of story structure to alternative narrative structures.Journal of Educational Psychology.
Fry, E. (1963).Teaching machines and programmed instruction: An introduction. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Hansen, J. (1981). The effects of inference training and practice in young children's comprehension.Reading Research Quarterly, 16, 391–417.
Hansen, J., & Pearson, P. D. (1983). An instructional study: Improving the inferential comprehension of good and poor fourth-grade readers.Journal of Educational Psychology, 75, 821–829.
Idol, L. (1987). Group story mapping: A comprehension strategy for both skilled and unskilled readers.Journal of Learning Disabilities, 20, 196–205.
Idol, L., & Croll, V. J. (1987). Story-mapping training as a means of improving reading comprehension.Learning Disability Quarterly, 10, 214–229.
Lewis, C. S. (1953).The silver chair. New York: MacMillan.
Paris, S. G. & Myers, M. (1981). Comprehension monitoring, memory and study strategies of good and poor readers.Journal of Reading Behavior, 13, 5–22.
Pressley, M., Johnson, C. J., Symons, S., McGoldrick, J. A., & Kurita, J. A. (1989). Strategies that improve children's memory and comprehension of text.The Elementary School Journal, 90, 3–32.
Raphael, T. E., & Wonnacott, C. A. (1981, December).Metacognitive training in question-answering strategies: Implementation in a 4th grade developmental reading program. Paper presented at the National Reading Conference, Dallas, Texas.
Rubin, A. D. (1978).A theoretical taxonomy of the differences between oral and written language. Unpublished manuscript, University of Illinois, Champaigne, Illinois.
Ryan, E. B. (1981). Identifying and remediating failures in reading comprehension: Towards an instructional approach for poor comprehenders. In T. Q. Waller & G. E. MacKinnon (Eds.),Reading research: Advances in theory and practice (Vol 3, pp. 224–262). New York: Academic Press.
Short, E. J., & Ryan, E. B. (1984). Metacognitive differences between skilled and less skilled readers: Remediating deficits through story grammar and attribution training.Journal of Educational Psychology, 76, 225–235.
Stein, N. L., & Glenn, C. G. (1979). An analysis of story comprehension in elementary school children. In R. Freedle (Ed.),Multidisciplinary approaches to discourse comprehension (pp. 53–120). Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
Wechsler, D. (1974).Wechsler intelligence scale for children-revised. New York: The Psychological Corporation.
Wong, B. Y. L., & Jones, W. (1982). Increasing metacomprehension in learning disabled and normally achieving students through self-questioning.Learning Disabilities Quarterly, 5, 228–240.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Short, E.J., Yeates, K.O. & Feagans, L.V. The generalizability of story grammar training across setting and tasks. J Behav Educ 2, 105–120 (1992). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00947115
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00947115