Improving Content-Area Reading Using Instructional Graphics

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of using a particular type of instructional graphic, a "frame," on fourth and fifth graders' ability to learn from reading their social studies textbooks.Six fourth-and six fifth-grade teachers taught social studies using either frames or the instruction suggested in the teacher's edition of the regular classroom social studies textbook.The treatment was repeated in four rounds (replications) during the school year.The major result from the combined analysis of the four rounds is that for fifth graders but not necessarily for fourth graders, framing was a more effective instructional technique than was the instruction suggested in the teacher's edition. IMPROVING CONTENT AREA READING USING INSTRUCTIONAL GRAPHICSStudents have difficulty understanding and learning from informational text.A recent summary of findings from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (Applebee, Langer, & Mullis, 1989) includes this dismal conclusion about the reading ability of American students:The failure of 61 percent of the 17-year-olds to demonstrate the ability to find, understand, summarize, and explain relatively complicated information, including material about topics they study in school, suggests that most students leaving secondary school do not have the comprehension skills often needed in the worlds of higher education, business, or government.(p.22)Why do many students have trouble learning from informational text?There are many contributing and interacting factors, including motivational, situational, and cognitive.The focus in this report is on cognitive factors.