Effects of Reading Comprehension Interventions for Students with Learning Disabilities

We examined 48 studies of interventions designed to affect the reading comprehension of students with learning disabilities and coded their characteristics and effect sizes. Our analyses revealed that students who received the researchers' experimental methods obtained reading comprehension scores that were higher than those of 87% of students in comparison groups. Strong effects were more likely when students' performance was assessed on lower level comprehension measures, when the study author delivered the interventions, and when the experimental students' performance was compared to that of students who did not receive any special intervention. These results indicate that although effective reading comprehension interventions exist, there are gaps between their use in research and practice.