The Role of an Adequate Schema for Reading in Good and Poor Readers’ Comprehension of Text

Abstract

Good and poor readers in second, fourth, and sixth grades, randomly selected from students scoring above or below grade on the reading comprehension subtest of the California Achievement Test, were given a questionnaire about reading and a set of passages altered to restrict meaning. Replies were examined to see if good and poor readers differed in their inclusion of meaning or if a significant relationship existed between meaning inclusion and grade level, meaning inclusion and comprehension achievement scores, and meaning inclusion and intelligence. No significant difference was found between good and poor readers in their inclusion of meaning nor significant relationships found between meaning inclusion and grade level, comprehension scores, or intelligence. Good comprehenders offered more decoding-centered responses than poor comprehenders, and fourth graders exhibited more emphasis on meaning than sixth graders. These results were contrary to the findings of Canney and Winograd (1979) whose research the present study attempted to replicate. An examination of reading program emphasis and replication of the study using different populations were suggested.