Discussion of Findings
Reading Comprehension
Listening Comprehension
Metacognition
Overall, the two students, who participated in this study, made some progress in their ability to comprehend information taken from short stories and passages. This was demonstrated by improved scores on all three assessments for subject A and B for nonfiction texts and subject B for fiction texts.
The students’ change in scores on the oral retelling rubrics for fiction and nonfiction texts from pre-intervention to post-intervention indicated an improved ability to retell stories with more independence. For a more detailed explanation of test results see Summary of Findings For Each Student by Test Type
The two subjects demonstrated some improvement on the scores obtained on the Developmental Reading Assessment (DRA), which was reported using the total score of the comprehension skills and strategies subtest. Additionally, changes in scores were discussed for each category within this subtest. It is important to note that for subject A, the DRA fiction test was not obtained posttest; therefore, no information will be reported for comparison, which impacts the outcome of the study for subject A. Moreover, the same story was administered prior to and following intervention for the nonfiction text of the DRA for subject A further impacting the outcome of this study. For a more detailed explanation of test results see Summary of Findings For Each Student by Test Feature.
The results on the Informal Reading Inventory-7 (B/BIRI-7) showed that the two students answered more questions correctly through question-answer procedures following explicit metacognitive strategies instruction for fiction and nonfiction texts. It is important to note that the same passage was administered pretest and posttest for the nonfiction passage for both subject A and B due to the alternate passage being fiction, which would have made it impossible to compare performance. For a more detailed explanation of test results see Summary of Findings For Each Student by Test Feature.
The improvements in the students’ reading comprehension skills were considered strongly supported for subject B based on the student’s ability to perform better on posttest scores for all three tests that were administered for fiction and nonfiction text. Subject A also performed better on posttest scores for all three assessments for nonfiction texts; however, due to no data being obtained for the fiction text on the DRA and the same text being administered for the nonfiction text on the DRA, the outcomes of change must be interpreted with caution. The triangulation of assessments, which provided strong evidence that improvements in reading comprehension were achieved for subject B for fiction and nonfiction, and for nonfiction text for subject A, supported some progress in reading comprehension for the two subjects that participated in this study.
The two subjects who participated in this study demonstrated progress on at least two of the three measures administered for listening comprehension.
Performance on the CELF-4: Understanding Spoken paragraphs revealed that both students made gains on their post-intervention scores. This standardized test measured fiction and nonfiction passages collectively, offering one score. For a more detailed explanation of test results see Summary of Findings For Each Student by Test Type.
The oral retelling rubrics were administered prior to and following intervention to determine a change in performance in listening comprehension. Overall, the students made gains in their ability to listen to a story and retell a story using appropriate story grammar elements. For a more detailed explanation of test results see Summary of Findings For Each Student by Test Type.
The B/RIRI-7 was given to assess skills in listening comprehension as a pretest and a posttest for fiction and nonfiction text. The students made gains in the ability to comprehend nonfiction texts that were read aloud. Either no change in performance or a decrease was observed on the posttest scores for fictional texts, revealing no improvements in comprehension for fictional texts on this test. For a more detailed explanation of test results see Summary of Findings For Each Student by Test Feature.
Based on the students’ performance, it was found that students made marginal to significant improvements in their awareness of strategies on the Metacomprehension Strategies Index (MSI) by receiving explicit instruction in metacognitive strategies that included knowledge and use of strategies before, during, and after reading. For a more detailed explanation of MSI results see Summary of Findings For Each Student by Test Type. Despite improved scores on the awareness of strategies, their application of these strategies was limited to structured tasks during guided reading groups. Neither of the students demonstrated the ability to independently apply these strategies on independent reading tasks as indicated by no change in scores on the DRA metacognitive awareness subtest for fiction (subject B only) or nonfiction text at the posttest. For a more detailed explanation of DRA test results see Summary of Findings For Each Student by Test Feature.