Abstract
This chapter focuses on language and comprehension at the local or word level and sentence level of text processing. English is more than just a phonetic language; printed words are not only composed of phonemes and graphemes but are also represented as meaning constituents in the form of morphemes, words, phrases, sentences, etc. It is asserted that these meaning constituents will play a vital role in efficient reading comprehension. The chapter will develop the notion that it is not only the breadth of word knowledge that is important for reading progress but it is also reliant upon the depth and quality of the lexical representations encoded in memory. However, good comprehension is not only confined to the knowledge of word meanings but is also related to other factors such as vocabulary, context, and fluency that extends meaning to connected text.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Anderson, J.R., and P. Freebody. 1981. Vocabulary knowledge. In Comprehension and Teaching: Research Reviews, ed. J.T. Guthrie, New York: International Reading Association.
Apthorp, H.S. 2006. Effects of a supplemental vocabulary program in third-grade reading/language arts. Journal of Educational Research 100(2): 67–79.
Bashir, A.S., and P.E. Hook. 2009. Fluency: A key link between word identification and comprehension. Language, Speech & Hearing Services in Schools 40(2): 196–200.
Bayliss, D.M., C. Jarrold, A.D. Baddeley, and E. Leigh. 2005. Differential constraints on the working memory and reading abilities of individuals with learning difficulties and typically developing children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 92: 76–99.
Beck, I.L., and C. Juel. 1992. The role of decoding in learning to read. In What research has to say about reading instruction, ed. S.J. Samuels and A.E. Farstrup, 101–144. Newark: International Reading Association.
Bishop, D.V.M. 1997. Uncommon understanding: Development and disorder of language comprehension in children. Hove: Psychological Press.
Bishop, D.V.M., and M.J. Snowling. 2004. Developmental dyslexia and specific language impairment: Same or different? Psychological Bulletin 130: 858–886.
Blachowicz, C.L.Z., P.J.L. Fisher, and D. Ogle. 2006a. Vocabulary: Questions from the classroom. Reading Research Quarterly 41(4): 524–529.
Block, C.C., and M. Pressley. 2002. Comprehension instruction: Research-based best practices. New York: Guilford Press.
Bos, C.S. 1999. Informed flexible teaching: Promoting student advocacy and action. In Learning disabilities: Advocacy and action, ed. P. Westwood and W. Scott, 9–20. Melbourne: Australian Resource Educators’ Association Inc.
Bowers, P.G., and K. Sunseth. 2002. Rapid naming and phonemic awareness: Contributions to reading, spelling, and orthographic knowledge. Scientific Studies of Reading 6: 401–429.
Bowyer-Crane, C., and M.J. Snowling. 2005. Assessing children’s inference generation: What do tests of reading comprehension measure? British Journal of Educational Psychology 75: 189–201.
Byrne, B., and R. Fielding-Barnsley. 1995. Evaluation of a program to teach phonemic awareness to young children: A 2 and 3-year follow-up and a new preschool trial. Journal of Educational Psychology 87: 488–503.
Cain, K. 2007. Deriving word meanings from context: Does explanation facilitate contextual analysis? Journal of Research in Reading 30(4): 347–359.
Cain, K., and J. Oakhill. 1999. Inference making ability and its relation to comprehension failure in young children. Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal 11: 489–503.
Cartwright, K.B. 2006. Fostering flexibility and comprehension in elementary students. The reading Teacher 59(7): 628–634.
Clay, M.M. 1978. Reading: The patterning of complex behaviour. Auckland: Heinemann Educational Books.
De Lemos, M.M. 2004. Effective strategies for the teaching of reading: What works and why. In Learning difficulties: Multiple perspectives, ed. B.A. Knight and W. Scott, 187–202. Frenchs Forest: Pearson.
Deacon, S.H., and J.R. Kirby. 2004. Morphological awareness: Just “more phonological”? The roles of morphological and phonological awareness in reading development. Applied Psycholinguistics 25(2): 223–239.
Dewitz, P., and P.K. Dewitz. 2003. They can read the words, but they can’t understand: Refining comprehension assessment. The Reading Teacher 56: 422–435.
Fielding-Barnsley, R., Hay, I., and Ashman, A. 2005. Phonological awareness: Necessary but not sufficient. National conference of the Australian Association of Special Education, Brisbane, 23–25 Sept 2005.
Fry, E. 2002. Readability versus levelling. The Reading Teacher 56: 286–291.
L.B. 2004. Exploring the connection between oral language and early reading. The Reading Teacher 57: 490–492.
Gambrell, L.B., B.A. Kapinus, and R.M. Wilson. 1987. Using mental imagery and summarization to achieve independence in comprehension. Journal of Reading 30(7): 638–642.
Gersten, R., L.S. Fuchs, J.P. Williams, and S. Baker. 2001. Teaching reading comprehension strategies to students with learning disabilities: A review of research. Review of Educational Research 71: 279–320.
Gunning, T.G. 2003. The role of readability in today’s classrooms. Topics in Language Disorders 23: 175–200.
Guthrie, J.T., A.L.W. Hoa, A. Wigfield, S.M. Tonks, N.M. Humenick, and E. Littles. 2007. Reading motivation and reading comprehension growth in later elementary years. Contemporary Educational Psychology 32: 282–313.
Harris, K.R., and M. Pressley. 1991. The nature of cognitive strategy instruction: Interactive strategy instruction. Exceptional Children 57: 392–404.
Hattie, J., and H. Timperley. 2007. The power of feedback. Review of Educational Research 77(1): 81–112.
Horner, S.L., and C.S. Shwery. 2002. Becoming an engaged, self-regulated reader. Theory into Practice 41(2): 102–109.
Juel, C. 1998. Learning to read and write: A longitudinal study of 54 children from first through fourth grades. Journal of Educational Psychology 80: 417–447.
Kamhi, A., and H. Catts. 2002. The language basis of reading: Implications for classification and treatment of children with reading disabilities. In Speaking, reading, and writing in children with language learning disabilities: New paradigms in research and practice, ed. K.G. Butler and E. Silliman, 45–72. Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum Pub.
Katzir, T., Y. Kim, M. Wolf, and B. O’Brien. 2006. Reading Fluency: The whole is more than the parts. Annals of Dyslexia 56(1): 51–83.
Klauda, S.L., and J.T. Guthrie. 2008. Relationships of three components of reading fluency to reading comprehension. Journal of Educational Psychology 100(2): 310–321.
Kuhn, M.R., and T. Rasinski. 2007. Best practices in fluency instruction. In Best practices in literacy instruction, 3rd ed, ed. L.B. Gambrell, L.M. Morrow, and M. Pressley, 204–219. New York: The Guilford Press.
Kuhn, M.R., and S.A. Stahl. 1998. Teaching children to learn word meanings from context: A synthesis and some questions. Journal of Literacy Research 30: 119–138.
LaBerg, D., and S.J. Samuels. 1974. Toward a theory of automatic information processing in reading. Cognitive Psychology 6: 293–323.
Leach, J.M., H.S. Scarborough, and L. Rescorla. 2003. Late-emerging reading disabilities. Journal of Educational Psychology 95: 211–224.
Lewis, C.S. 1955. The magician’s nephew. London: Collins.
Louden, W., L.K.S. Chan, J. Elkins, D. Greaves, H. House, M. Milton, S. Nichols, J. Rivalland, M. Rohl, and C. van Kraayennoord. 2000. Mapping the territory, primary students with learning difficulties: Literacy and numeracy, Vols. 1, 2 & 3, Canberra: Department of Education, Training and Youth Affairs.
Ludwig, C. 2004. Literacy in the learning Areas: A proposition. Literacy learning in the Middle Years 8: 37–53.
McCutchen, D., L. Green, and R.D. Abbott. 2008. Children’s morphological knowledge: Links to literacy. Reading Psychology 29: 289–314.
McDonald Connor, C., F.J. Morrison, and P.S. Underwood. 2007. A second chance in second grade: The independent and cumulative impact of first - and second-grade reading instruction and students’ letter-word reading skill growth. Scientific Studies of Reading 11(3): 199–233.
McKeon, M.G., I.L. Beck, and R.G.K. Blake. 2009. Rethinking reading comprehension instruction: A comparison of instruction for strategies and content approaches. Reading Research Quarterly 44(3): 218–253.
Meyer, M.S., and R.H. Felton. 1999. Repeated reading to enhance fluency: Old approaches and new directions. Annals of Dyslexia 49: 283–307.
Nation, K., and F. Norbury. 2005. Why reading comprehension fails; Insights from developmental disorders. Topics in Language Disorders 25: 21–32.
Nation, K., and M.J. Snowling. 1988. Individual differences in contextual facilitation: Evidence from dyslexia and poor reading comprehension. Child Development 69(4): 996–1012.
Nation, K., P. Clarke, and M.J. Snowling. 2002. General cognition ability in children with reading comprehension difficulties. British Journal of Psychology 72: 549–560.
National Reading Panel. 2000. Teaching children to read: Report of the comprehension instruction subgroup to the National Institute of Child Health and Development. Washington, DC: NICD.
Neal, J.C. 2002. Closing the gap: Providing late intervention for struggling learners in grades 4–8. Reading and Writing Quarterly 18: 97–99.
Neal, J.C., and P.R. Kelly. 2002. Delivering the promise of academic success through late intervention. Reading and Writing Quarterly 18: 101–117.
O’Connor, R.E., H.L. Swanson, and C. Geraghty. 2010. Improvement in reading rate under independent and difficult text levels: Influences on word and comprehension skills. Journal of Educational Psychology 102(1): 1–19.
Palincsar, A.S., and A.L. Brown. 1984. Reciprocal teaching of comprehension-fostering and comprehension-monitoring activities. Cognition and Instruction 1: 117–175.
Pearson, P.D., and D.D. Johnson. 1978. Teaching reading comprehension. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
Pearson, P.D., L.R. Roehler, J.A. Dole, and G.G. Duffy. 1992. Developing expertise in reading comprehension. In What research has to say about reading instruction, ed. S.J. Samuels and A.E. Farstrup, 101–144. Newark: International Reading Association.
Pearson, P.D., E.H. Hiebert, and M.L. Kamil. 2007. Vocabulary assessment: What we know and what we need to learn. Reading Research Quarterly 42(2): 282–296.
Perfetti, C. 2007. Reading ability: Lexical Quality to Comprehension. Scientific Studies of Reading 11(4): 357–383.
Perfetti, C., J. Rouet, and M.A. Britt. 1999. Toward a theory of documents representation. In The construction of mental representation during reading, ed. H. Oostendorp, 99–122. Malwah: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Pressley, M.G. 1998. Reading instruction that works: The case for balanced teaching. New York: The Gilford Press.
Reed, D. 2008. A synthesis of morphological interventions and effects on reading outcomes for students in grades K-12. Learning Disabilities Research and Practice 23(1): 36–49.
Reid Lyon, G. 2003. Defining dyslexia, comorbidity, teachers’ knowledge of language and reading. Annals of Dyslexia 53: 1–14.
Rohrbeck, C.A., M.D. Ginsburg-Block, and J.W. Fantuzzo. 2003. Peer assisted learning with elementary school students: A meta-analytic review. Journal of Educational Psychology 95: 240–257.
Rutter, M., and L. Mawhood. 1991. The long-term psychosocial sequence of specific developmental disorders of speech and language. In Biological risk factors for psychosocial disorders, ed. M. Rutter and P. Caesaer, 233–259. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Samuels, S.J., and R.F. Flor. 1997. The importance of automaticity for developing expertise in reading. Reading and Writing Quarterly: Overcoming Learning Difficulties 13: 107–121.
Savage, R., N. Lavers, and V. Pillay. 2007. Working memory and reading difficulties: What we know and what we don’t know about the relationship. Educational Psychology Review 19: 185–121.
Shute, V.J. 2008. Focus on formative feedback. Review of Educational Research 78(1): 153–189.
Snow, C.E. 2002. Reading for understanding: Toward a research and development program in reading comprehension. Santa Monica: Rand Corp. Retrieved 12 Dec, 2002, from http://www.rand.org/publications/MR/MR1465/.
Snow, C.E., S. Burns, and P. Griffin. 1998. Preventing reading difficulties in young children. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.
Snowling, M., D.V.M. Bishop, and S.E. Stothard. 2000. Is preschool language impairment a risk factor for dyslexia in adolescence? Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry and Allied Disciplines 41: 587–600.
Snowling, M.J., J.W. Adams, D.V.M. Bishop, and S.E. Stothard. 2001. Educational attainments of school leavers with a preschool history of speech-language impairments. International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders 36: 173–183.
Stahl, A.S., and B.A. Kapinus. 1991. Possible sentences: Predicting word meanings to teach content area vocabulary. The Reading Teacher 45: 36–43.
Stanovich, K.E. 1986. Matthew effects in reading: Some consequences of individual differences in the acquisition of literacy. Reading Research Quarterly 21: 360–407.
Tannenbaum, K.R., J. Torgensen, and R.K. Wagner. 2006. Relationships between word knowledge and reading comprehension in third-grade children. Scientific Studies of Reading 14(4): 381–398.
Tomblin, J.B., N.L. Records, P. Buckwalter, X. Zhang, E. Smith, and M. O’Brien. 1997. The prevalence of specific language impairment in kindergarten children. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research 40: 1245–1260.
Trabasso, T. 1981. On the making of inferences during reading and their recall. In Comprehension and teaching: Research reviews, ed. J.T. Guthrie, 56–75. Chicago: International Reading Association.
Tunmer, W.E., J.W. Chapman, K.T. Greaney, and J.E. Prochnow. 2002. The contribution of educational psychology to intervention research and practice. International Journal of Disability, Development and Education 49: 11–29.
van Kraayenoord, C., J. Elkins, C. Palmer, F. Rickards, and P. Colbert. 2004. Literacy learning in the middle years for students with disabilities. Literacy Learning in the Middle Years 9: 9–15.
Vellutino, F.R., D.M. Scanlon, and D. Spearing. 1995. Semantic and phonological coding in poor and normal readers. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 59(1): 76–123.
Vellutino, F.R., J.M. Fletcher, M.J. Snowling, and D.M. Scanlon. 2004. Specific reading disability (dyslexia): what have we learned in the past four decades? Journal of Child Psychiatry 45(1): 2–40.
Vellutino, F.R., W.E. Tunmer, J.J. Jaccard, and R. Chen. 2007. Components of reading ability: Multivariate evidence for a convergent skills model of reading development. Scientific Studies of Reading 11(1): 3–32.
Wharton-McDonald, R. 2002. The need for increased comprehension instruction. In Reading instruction that works: The case for balanced teaching, ed. M. Pressley, 236–288. New York: The Gilford Press.
Wigfield, A. 2000. Facilitating children’s reading motivation. In Engaging young readers: Promoting achievement and motivation, ed. L. Baker, M.J. Dreher, and J.T. Guthrie, 140–158. New York: Guilford Press.
Wigfield, A., J.T. Guthrie, S. Tonks, and K.C. Perencevich. 2004. Children’s motivation for reading: Domain specificity and instructional influences. The Journal of Educational Research 97(6): 299–309.
Wolf, M., and P.G. Bowers. 2000. Naming-speed processes and developmental reading disabilities: An introduction to the special issue on the double-deficit hypothesis. Journal of Learning Disabilities 33: 322–324.
Woolley, G.E. 2006. Comprehension difficulties after year 4: Actioning appropriately. Australian Journal of Learning Difficulties 11(3): 125–130.
Worthy, J., E. Patterson, R. Salas, S. Prater, and M. Turner. 2002. More than just reading: The human factor in reaching resistant readers. Reading Research and Instruction 41: 177–202.
Zhang, H., and R. Hoosain. 2001. The influence of narrative text characteristics on thematic inference during reading. Journal of Research in Reading 24: 173–186.
Pressley, M. 2002a. At-risk students: Learning to break through comprehension barriers. In Improving comprehension instruction, ed. C. Collins Block, L.B. Gambrell, and M. Pressley, 354–369. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Pressley, M. 2002b. Improving comprehension instruction: A path for the Future. In Improving comprehension instruction, ed. C. Collins Block, L.B. Gambrell, and M. Pressley, 385–389. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Blachowicz, C.L.Z., P.J.L. Fisher, D. Ogle, S. Watts-Taffe, and North Regional Education Laboratory. 2006b. Integrated vocabulary instruction: Meeting the needs of diverse learners in grades K-5. Chicago: Learning Point Associates.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2011 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Woolley, G. (2011). Word Level and Discourse Processing of Text. In: Reading Comprehension. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1174-7_5
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1174-7_5
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-94-007-1173-0
Online ISBN: 978-94-007-1174-7
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawEducation (R0)