Evaluation

The NRP found six studies that experimentally examined training teachers to teach comprehension instruction.

Grade Levels

Teachers were trained to teach students multiple strategies from grades 2 through 11. The distribution is fairly uniform over this range of grades. Of interest is the fact that all the studies, save one (Franklin, 1993), were carried out on "poor readers", "disabled students", or "low achievers". 

Experimenter Tests

With respect to the teachers' learning and being faithful to the treatment, all six studies claim success. With respect to whether students benefit from the teachers who were trained in instructing multiple reading strategies, 2 studies report successful improvement in the subject matter of the instruction.

Standardized Tests

Two studies report success in producing improvement in performance on standardized comprehension tests.

Summary Evaluation of Training Teachers.

This is a very important area for study. In order to implement the teaching of reading strategies in naturalistic classroom environments, it is important to know how and whether teachers can be effectively trained in the instructional procedures. Further, it is important to learn about the time and other costs that are associated with such instruction. Finally, it is important to determine whether the students as well as the teachers learn and benefit from the teacher training. This small set of studies indicate that teachers can learn to implement comprehension strategy Comprehension strategies foster active reading and guide a reader to become more self-aware of the reader’s own-understanding during reading. instruction in the classroom under natural teaching circumstances.  They also suggest that students benefit from such instruction by trained teachers. There is a need to carry out further training studies of this kind and on a wider range of readers. Normal readers as well as others who are less skilled in reading could benefit from implementation of the teaching of multiple reading comprehension Interpretations made by a reader during reading a text and stored in stored the reader's memory in a way that facillitates the reader's ability to put what was read and interpreted to some use, e.g., to answer questions about that text. strategies, not only in reading instruction, but in content areas as well.