Relationships between sixth-graders’ reading comprehension and two different measures of print exposure

Abstract

This study examined sixth-graders' reading comprehension and component reading abilities in relation to two measures of print exposure: an author recognition test (ART) involving fiction authors and a reading habits questionnaire (RHQ) about children's voluntary reading for enjoyment across various genres. The ART correlated only with children's fiction book reading habits, not with other habits such as nonfiction book or magazine reading, and had a stronger relationship to all tested reading abilities than did the RHQ. Strong comprehenders in reading outperformed weak comprehenders on all component reading measures, ART score, and fiction habits; however, weak comprehenders scored higher than did strong comprehenders on the indicator of nonfiction reading habits. The two groups of comprehenders did not differ significantly on other reported reading habits. The results are discussed in relation to children's specific book choices and demonstrate the relevance of genre to evaluations of children's print exposure.Not long ago, the Commissioner of Education in our state convened a reading summit attended by reading specialists, general educators, higher education faculty, and others with an interest in children's reading achievement. A central purpose of the summit was to address stagnant scores on the state-mandated reading comprehension assessment. One common viewpoint was captured on local radio by an attendee who

Exploring the relationship between adolescent’s reading skills, reading motivation and reading habits

“…Therefore, it is not the case that past print exposure predicts reading skills but rather exposure to extended texts, in particular fiction book reading. These results are consistent with research demonstrating a closer relationship between reading skills and book reading compared to other text types (Anderson et al, 1988) and fiction book reading in particular (Spear-Swerling et al, 2010). However, the association between reading skill and reading activities is reciprocal (Mol & Bus, 2011), as students' reading habits are also influenced by their reading skills.…”

“…For example, Anderson et al (1988) found that time spent reading books was more strongly associated with reading comprehension and reading speed than other text types (e.g., comics, newspapers and magazines). Similarly, Spear-Swerling, Brucker and Alfano (2010) found that fiction book reading was more closely associated with various reading-related skills (i.e., word reading, oral comprehension, vocabulary and reading comprehension) compared to other reading habits.…”

“…Indeed, Anderson et al (1988) and Spear-Swerling et al (2010) demonstrated that several reading skills were more closely associated with book reading than other forms of reading (e.g., magazines, newspapers). In terms of ability differences in the strength of the association between reading skill and affective and behavioural aspects of reading, research is scarce.…”

“…Due to the low internal consistency on the extended traditional texts, these were split to examine each book type separately. In addition, previous research had highlighted differential relationships between these different book types and reading skill (Spear-Swerling et al, 2010). An item deletion approach was adopted for short traditional texts and short digital texts; however this did not improve the alpha value, therefore no items were removed.…”

The Effect of Reading Motivations of 6th, 7th and 8th Grade Students on Reading Attitudes: A Structural Equation Modeling

“…Likewise, Kantarcı (2015), in his study on the 4th grade students, revealed that reading motivation explains 9% of academic achievement of Turkish course and that reading motivation is more effective than other variables in increasing academic achievement in this subject. Reading motivation influences reading frequency, vocabulary knowledge, vocabulary, reading fluency and reading comprehension (McGeown, Duncan, Griffiths and Stothard, 2015;Spear-Swerling, Brucker and Alfano, 2010) as well as academic achievement and it brings the significance of its effect on reading attitude into the forefront. The positive relationship between reading attitude and reading comprehension (Sallabaş, 2008;Şeflek Kovacıoğlu, 2006), academic achievement of Turkish course (Kocaarslan, 2016;Baş and Şahin, 2012;Karabay and Kuşdemir Kayıran, 2010) and overall academic achievement (Crosby, 2013;Ward, 2013;Kaniuka, 2010;Martinez, Aricak and Jewell, 2008) clearly demonstrates the impact of this affective variable on reading skills and academic life.…”