Date Approved
9-12-2016
Embargo Period
9-12-2016
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
M.A. Special Education
Department
Interdisciplinary and Inclusive Education
College
College of Education
Advisor
Kuder, Sydney
Committee Member 1
Xin, Joy
Keywords
graphic organizers, inferential thinking
Subject(s)
Reading comprehension; Learning disabled children; Metacognition
Disciplines
Special Education and Teaching
Abstract
The purpose of the study was to examine improvement of reading comprehension on students with specific learning disabilities in the seventh grade through the direct and explicit teaching of inferring. The students were taught to use a graphic organizer to aid their metacognition related to making an inference. Each student was identified as having weak inferential thinking skills through the Fountas and Pinnell Reading Assessment and the easyCBM long reading comprehension assessment. Data was collected during a baseline phase, intervention phase, and post-intervention phase. The independent variable was the use of a graphic organizer that aided in the strategy of making an inference. The dependent variable was the measure of the participants' overall reading comprehension using the Fountas and Pinnell and easyCBM assessment. Overall, the results of the study demonstrated improvement in reading comprehension in the Fountas and Pinnell Assessment. Five out of seven students showed growth and one student maintained proficiency levels with the easyCBM assessment. Results of the study showed that metacognitive strategies improve overall reading comprehension when taught directly and explicitly as well as consistently within content areas.
Recommended Citation
Muller, Rebecca Berkowitz, "The effect of explicit teaching of inferring on the reading comprension of students with learning disabilities in middle school" (2016). Theses and Dissertations. 2265.
https://rdw.rowan.edu/etd/2265
