Developmental and Individual Differences in Reading Comprehension

Two experiments investigated developmental and individual differences in children's story comprehension and recall, as a function of story organization and presentation modality. In Experiment 1, children in Grades 3 to 6 read silently, read orally, or listened to well-organized and poorly organized stories. Both amount recalled and reliance on text organization increased with grade. Performance did not differ for passages that were read silently versus listened to, but oral reading facilitated the comprehension of good stories, especially for the poorest readers. At each grade level, a group of poor readers was identified who showed little sensitivity to story organization in either silent reading or listening. The second experiment showed that for these poor readers the oral-reading advantage occurred for well-organized but not for poorly organized stories. The poorest comprehenders also gained from an advance organizer that stressed the problem structure of the stories. Theoretical and instructional implications of the research are discussed.