Date of Award
2003
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Education
Department
Programs for Higher Education
Advisor
Donald D. Gainey
Committee Member
Judith R. Merz
Committee Member
Barbara Packer
Keywords
academic achievement, academic performance, behavior, clarifying, comprehension, Connecticut Mastery Test, content area curriculum, control groups, Degrees of Reading Power, eighth grade students, experimental groups, independent readers, language arts, literacy skills, low achievement, middle school students, motivation, predicting, previewing, prior knowledge, questions, ratings survey, reading comprehension, reading strategies, remedial reading, science, seventh grade students, social studies, student motivation, study skills, summarizing, visualizing
Abstract
This applied dissertation was designed to determine the effectiveness of an integrated reading and study skills program intervention implemented for seventh and eighth grade middle school students identified as having problems in motivation and academic achievement. The design of the program was based on current research regarding best practices on improving the motivation and literacy skills of middle school students. Student achievement results for this new program were compared with those for a previous program that did not integrate content area curriculum.
Participants attended the program for one class period each day and received instruction on reading strategies to improve comprehension of required readings in social studies, science, and language arts. These strategies included previewing, predicting, formulating questions, activating prior knowledge, visualizing, clarifying, and summarizing. The goal of the program was to assist students in becoming independent readers of academic and other texts by using the strategies to accomplish their class work and improve their academic performance.
An analysis of the data revealed that students in both the experimental and non-equivalent control groups made significant comprehension gains but found no significant differences between the groups based on 8th grade Connecticut Mastery Test Degrees of Reading Power scores. However, report card data for both groups showed the experimental students received consistently higher grades and demonstrated academic improvement over time. They also improved in motivation and behavior during the time in the program based on teacher responses to a ratings survey.