Research in English: Problems in Comprehension and Strategy

10-second review: Teaching students to understand the various structures of expository texts.

Title: “Web-based Tutoring of the Structure Strategy with or without Elaborated Feedback or Choice for Fifth- and Seventh-grade Readers.” BJF Meyer, et al. Reading Research Quarterly (January /February/ March 2010), 62 – 92.

Quote: “The National Reading :Panel…identified text comprehension as a critical goal. After the primary grades, students increasingly are expected to learn from expository texts in social studies and science…. Comprehension from such texts is critical for academic success…. But many students have problems with reading comprehension. The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP, 2007) reported that approximately one-third of fourth-grade students and one-fourth of eighth-grade students could not read at the basic level required to understand what they read. Just one-third read at or above proficient levels.” P. 62.

Quote: “The Structure Strategy focuses on common patterns used by authors to organize expository texts and to convey main ideas…. The Structure Strategy explicitly teaches learners to follow the logical structure through…use of knowledge about text structures….” P. 63.

Example of the main idea from the comparison text structure:. ………. And ………. (two or more ideas) were compared on ………., ………. And ………. . For example: Killer whales and blue whales were compared on size, color, and life span.

Example of the main idea from the problem and solution structure: The problem is ………., and the solution is ………. . For example: The ;problem is seven endangered whale species and the solution is a whale sanctuary in the Antarctic Ocean.

Comment: I have selected ideas from this research that describe the problem and examples of the strategy. I frankly became lost in verbiage and the jargon of educational research. Still, the idea is intriguing. The problem is comprehension. The strategy is explicit teaching of the text structures of expository writing. The examples are from the comparison text structure and the problem-solution text structure. For more information on the authors’ methods of teaching the structure of expository text and the results of their research, consult the article.

I don’t apologize for quitting reading this research. Beyond the beginning quotes that I have cited, the article becomes absolutely unreadable. It’s writing like this research study that is the reason most teachers don’t bother to read educational research. I say it’s the writing, that is the problem, not dumb teachers. Some experts in the teaching of writing have labeled such writing “gobbledygook.” RayS.