VOLUME 43 NUMBER 8 APRIL 2011

~WWW #Jiff

Reading Comprehension Instruction for Students

with Learning Disabilities

Asha K. Jitendra and Meenakshi Gajria

I
Reading comprehension, which refers to "the process of simultaneously extracting I
and constructing meaning through interaction and involvement with written language"
(Shanahan et al., 2010, p. 5) has garnered national attention through initiatives aimed at
improving reading performance in schools (Reading First, No Child Left Behind .Act
[NCLB]). Many students, especially students with learning disabilities, experience persis-

i
tent problems in comprehending text. These difficulties may not only be rooted in word
recognition skills that are not automatic, but they may also stem from limited cognitive
ability or problems with working memory, locating main ideas, inference making, flexibly
selecting and applying strategies, and monitoring and evaluating strategy i.;se (Gersten,
Fuchs, Williams, & Baker, 2001; Palincsar, David, Winn, & Stevens, 1991; Rich & Shep-
herd, 1993; Williams, 2004 ). Other factors such as insufficient prior knowledge, discrepant
language experiences, or the lack of strategic skills may negatively influence comprehen-
sion (Armbruster, Anderson, & Osterlag, 1987; Winograd, 1984). Specifically, students
with learning disabilities (LD), who are often characterized as passive readers (Torgesen,
1982), either lack or seldom activate reading comprehension strategies to access informa-
tion in textual material. Furthermore, they rarely monitor and evaluate their understanding
of text.
According to the 2009 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), the
percentage of fourth graders and eighth graders with disabilities who scored below the
basic level in reading achievement was substantially higher (66% and 63%, respectively)
than the percentage of fourth and eighth graders without disabilities (31 % and 22%,
respectively). That is, the majority of fourth graders and eighth graders with disabilities
who participated in the NAEP did not understand grade-level text enough to get the gist of
text. Although the advances made in designing effective decoding interventions are note-
worthy, considerably less research addresses children's comprehension deficits not caused
by decoding skill deficits or difficuJties with lexical access (i.e., word finding abilities). In
a synthesis of reading comprehension instruction for students with reading difficulties,
Gersten et al. (2001) discussed the importance of comprehension strategies (single and
multiple). Specifically, comprehension strategies should help "readers enhance their
understanding, overcome difficulties in comprehending text, and compensate for weak or

Dr. Jitendra is a professor in the Special Education program, Department of Educational Psychology at the
University of Minnesota. Dr. Gajria is a professor of education and chair of the Division of Teacher Education at
St. Thomas Aquinas College.

Copyright© Love Publishing Company, 20 11

2 FOCUS ON EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN APRIL 2011

imperfect knowledge related to the text" (Shanahan et al., assumption is that integration of instructional devices (e.g.,
2010, p. 10). graphic organizers) allows teachers to select, organize, and
The purpose of this article is to provide a summary of present difficult to understand material and make the text
effective comprehension strategies that focus on accessing more meaningful and accessible to students of varying abil -
knowledge to improve the comprehension skills of students ity levels, including students with LD. Research indicates
with LD. We use Gajria, Jitendra, Sood, and Sacks' (2007) that instruction using graphic organizers and matrices that
framework to organize comprehension strategies related to visually depict relationships between ideas (e.g., Bos &
enhancing student mastery of specific content (i .e., text Anders, 1990; DiCecco & Gleason, 2002), advance organiz-
enhancement strategies) and teaching students how to learn ers that prepare students for an upcoming lesson (e.g., Darch
and reflect (i.e., cognitive and metacognitive strategies) on & Gersten, 1986), story maps that emphasize story grammar
their comprehension. In addition, we provide readers with elements in narrative texts, outlines and study guides that
assessment techniques to monitor student progress to inform highlight critical information (e.g ., Horton & Lovitt, 1989),
reading comprehension instruction. mnemonic illustrations that make the information more
memorable (e.g., Mastropieri, Scruggs, & Levin, 1987), and
TEXT ENHANCEMENT STRATEGIES computer assisted instruction that provides opportunities for
independent review and practice (e.g., Okolo & Feretti,
Text enhancement strategies are approaches that teachers 1996) increase text comprehension and recall for students
can use to effectively plan and deliver instruction to promote with LD.
students' comprehension and retention of critical informa-
tion (Lenz, Bulgren, & Hudson, 1990). The underlying Graphic Organizers
Graphic organizers facilitate teaching and learning by
visually representing the organization of key concepts,
including their interrelationships, in a chapter or reading

FOCUSOfl passage (Darch & Eaves, 1986). Graphic organizers include

semantic or cognitive maps, semantic feature analysis, and
Exce_ntional Venn diagrams. A key feature of graphic organizers is that

children
they can be designed to represent different text structure pat-
terns. For example, a web or hierarchical concept map can
be used for a descriptive text structure, a flow chart for a
ISSN 0015-SllX
FOCUS ON EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN (USPS 203-360) is pub- cause-effect text structure, and a Venn diagram for a com-
lished monthly except June, July, and August as a service to teachers, pare-contrast text structure. Figure 1 presents a sample of
special educators, curriculum specialists, administrators, and those con-
cerned with the special education of exceptional children. This publica- graphic organizers based on the five different types of
tion is annotated and indexed by the ERIC Clearinghouse on Handi- expository text structures (Fisher, Frey, & Lapp, 2009; Pear-
capped and Gifted Children for publication in the monthly Current
Index to Journals in Education (CIJE) and the quarterly index, Excep- son & Johnson, 1978) together with the associated clue
tional Children Education Resources (ECER). The full text of Focus on words. The underlying rationale for these visual displays is
Exceptional Children is also available in the electronic versions of the
Education Index. It is also available in microfilm from Serials Acquisi- that they he] p students develop a schema for how the con-
tions, National Archive Publishing Company, P.O. Box 998, Ann Arbor, tent information is organized and provide them with a
Ml 48106-0998. Subscription rates: individual, $50 per year; institu- framework for connecting new information with their exist-
tions, $68 per year. Copyright © 2011, Love Publishing Company. All
rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or part without written permis- ing knowledge (Ausubel, 1963; Wittrock, 1992).
sion is prohibited. Printed in the United States of America. Periodical Integrating teacher or researcher constructed graphic
postage is paid at Denver, Colorado. POSTMASTER: Send address
changes to: organizers into content area instruction appears to be effec-
Love Publishing Company tive in promoting comprehension and retention of informa-
Executive and Editorial Office tion from text. In a series of studies with high school stu-
P.O. Box 22353
Denver, Colorado 80222 dents with LD, researchers documented the benefits of using
Telephone (303) 221-7333 semantic feature analysis, a relationship matrix that high-
CONSULTING EDITORS lights major concepts and vocabulary from a passage
Steve Graham Ron Nelson
(Anders, Bos, & Filip, 1984; Bos, Anders, Filip, & Jaffe,
Vanderbilt University University of Nebraska-Lincoln I 985, 1989). Students instructed using the matrix scored
Eva Hom better than students in the comparison condition, who used
University of Kansas a dictionary to define words and write a sentence for each
Carrie E. Watterson Stanley F. Love word. Similarly, use of graphic organizers displaying rela-
Senior Editor Publisher tionships among ideas within a unit or chapter increased
 3

Text Structure Word Signal Organizers

Description To begin with, first, second, several, WEB

numerous, for example, for instance,
most important, in fact, in addition

TemporaVSequence/ Next, first, second, then, originally, FLOWCHART

Eventl
Chronological Order finally, before, earlier, later, after,
following, soon, until, since, beginning,
during, eventually, numbers/letters ~
in parenthesis I I
Event3

Conclusion

TIME LINE
Event Event Event Event

I I]

Compare and Conversely, similarly, but, although, VENN DIAGRAM

Contrast as well as, unlike, on the other hand,
on the contrary, nevertheless, whereas,
rather than

MATRIX
ltem1 ltem2
Attribute 1
Attribute 2
Attribute 3

Problem and As a result, because, so that, PROBLEM SOLUTION Topic

Solution consequently, therefore, this led to, FLOWCHART
accordingly, thus Problem

Cause and Effect As a resuJt, because, so that, FISHBONE

consequently, therefore, this led to,
accordingly, thus

Source: Adapted from In a reading state of mind: Brain research, teacher modeling, and comprehension instruction (pp.
97-98), by D. Fisher, N. Frey, & D. Lapp (2009), Newark, DE: International Reading Association. Copyright 2009 by Inter-
national Reading Association. Reprinted with permission.

FIGURE 1. Graphic Organizers Based on Text Structure

4 FOCUS ON EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN APRIL 201 1

comprehension performance for both high school students time, place, problem, goal, action, and outcome) to teach
with LD (Darch & Eaves, 1986; Darch & Gersten, 1986) story grammar elements to elementary students with LD. At
and students with LD in grades 4 through 6 (Darch & Car- the completion of the intervention phase, the majority of stu-
nine, 1986; Griffin, Simmons, & Kame' enui, 1991 ). dents showed an increase in correct written responses to
Using a different approach, DiCecco and Gleason (2002) questions related to story grammar components. Further, the
studied the effectiveness of graphic organizers as a postread- improved performance was maintained following com ple-
ing rather than prereading activity on the social studies tion of instruction. The success of the intervention was evi-
content knowledge of middle school students with LD. In dent based on improved performance on standardized tests
addition to measuring factual comprehension using multi- of reading comprehension.
ple-choice tests, they used written essays to assess relational In addition to use of story maps as visual displays of crit-
content knowledge. Results indicated that the graphic orga- ical information in narrative texts, Crabtree et al. (2010) and
nizer group outperformed students in the traditional instruc- Taylor et al. (2002) worked with high school and eleme ntary
tion condition on relational content knowledge, but the two students with LD, who were presented with a list of story-
groups did not differ on factual content knowledge. It element questions (e.g., Who are the main characters? What
appears that graphic organizers can serve as retrieval cues are the problems or conflicts?) embedded at specific stop-
and assist students in recall and organization of pertinent ping points as prompts to self-monitor their comprehension
information. More recently, researchers documented the of story elements. At the completion of the interve ntion
positive effect of using computerized graphic organizers phase, story mapping and self-monitoring increased stu-
with content area learning in inclusive classrooms (Boon, dents' overall comprehension. Also encouraging are the
Burke, & Fore, 2006; Boon, Burke, Fore, & Hagan-Burke, results from studies of story mapping that indicate the m ain-
2006). When compared to traditional textbook instruction, tenance effects of the strategy over time (e.g., Crabtree et
instruction and review with computer-generated organizers al., 201 O; Gardill & Jitendra, 1999).
(using Inspiration 6 software) significantly increased recall
of social studies content on short essay recall questions for Mnemonic Illustrations
both students with and without disabilities. Given that many students with LD often experience
Despite the different approaches employed, graphic orga- problems memorizing abstract vocabulary and factual con-
nizers are effective instructional tools that facilitate compre- tent, mnemonic illustrations are particularly useful in help-
hension for students with LD across content areas, particu- ing them acquire content area information (Scruggs, Mas-
larly in social studies and science. In all the studies, the use tropieri, McLoone, Levin, & Morrison, 1987). Mnemonic
of graphic organizers consistently resulted in significantly devices facilitate learning by making unfamiliar, difficult to
higher performance on researcher-developed multiple understand information more concrete, meaningful, and
choice and free recall comprehension measures. However, memorable by adding relevant connections and linking the
in studies that assessed the long-term effects of the inter- information to students' existing knowledge base. Several
vention, students did not maintain the gains or transfer researchers have studied the impact of textually embedded
effects to novel reading passages or standardized reading mnemonic illustrations on comprehension and recall of
tests. This pattern of findings is consistent with other information. Illustrations are generally designed based on
research showing that students with LD fail to sponta- the keyword method, wherein a concrete, acoustically simi-
neously apply instructed strategies to new learning tasks lar keyword is created for a new vocabulary term followed
(Gersten et al., 2001 ). by an interactive illustration that demonstrates the meaning
or definition of the term (Atkinson, 1975). The keyword
Story Maps method developed originally to facilitate acquisition of for-
Story maps can be used to generate questions about nar- eign-language vocabulary also appears to influence memory
rative stories and as a prereading or postreading procedure for factual information.
to promote not only literal comprehension but also inferen- Scruggs et al. (] 987) examined the effect of mnemonic
tial thinking. The use of story maps has resulted in positive illustrations based on the keyword method on the acquisi -
effects for improving the comprehension of both elementary tion of science concepts with high school students with LD.
and secondary students with LD (e.g., Boulineau, Fore, Students read text about attributes of North American min-
Hagan-Burke, & Burke, 2004; Crabtree, Alber-Morgan, & erals, with either mnemonic or descriptive illustrations
Konrad, 2010; Gardill & Jitendra, 1999; Idol, 1987; Idol & inserted into the passages. Results indicated that mnemonic
Croll, 1987; Taylor, Alber, & Walker, 2002). Initial studies illustrations substantially enhanced learning of dichotomized
by Idol (1987) and Idol and Croll (1987) offered evidence of attributes of minerals. Similarly, Mastropieri et al. (1987)
the effectiveness of using a simple story map (character, demonstrated that, compared with descriptive illustrations,
 5

mnemonic illustrations facilitated recall of expository read- heterogeneous middle and high school classrooms to help
ing passages that provided reasons, in decreasing order of students acquire information from content area texts (Hor-
their plausibility, for dinosaur extinction for middle school ton & Lovitt, 1989).
students with LD.
Subsequent studies on mnemonic illustrations in the area Computer Assisted Instruction
of social studies have reported similar findings. Brigham, Use of computers and multimedia technology can incor-
Scruggs, and Mastropieri (1995) constructed maps display- porate critical instructional variables such as immediate
ing names of battles of the American Revolution and related feedback, correction, and self-pacing to enhance the presen-
battle information to teach history to middle school students tation of instructional material and improve students ' moti-
with LD. The maps presented the information in the same vation and reading comprehension. Also, teachers can use
format but used three different kinds of symbols: recon- computers to supplement instruction by providing students
structive elaborations of battle names, mnemonic keywords access to review, drill and practice exercises, and tutorials.
of battle names, and realistic drawings of soldiers and build- Okolo and Ferretti ( 1996) examined the effects of integrat-
ings. Mnemonic keywords resulted in higher recall of fea- ing multimedia technology in project based learning in
ture locations than traditional map symbols. However, recall social studies with middle school students with LD. Stu-
did not differ significantly between the mnemonic and elab- dents completed projects on the Revolutionary War using
orative groups. Similarity, Mastropieri, Scruggs, and Whe- either word processing or multimedia presentation tools.
don (1997) reported that keywords helped students remem- Significant improvement in students' performance was
ber significantly more US presidents than a traditional noted on the knowledge test in both conditions, with no dif-
instruction condi tion. More recently, mnemonic illustrations ference between the two groups; the authors attributed this
did not positively impact social studies performance of stu- finding to the similarity of activities in the two groups.
dents in inclusive high school classrooms, including stu- Torgesen ( 1986) reviewed the research literature on com-
dents with LD (Fontana, Scruggs, & Mastropieri, 2007). puter assisted instruction specifically for students with LD
The authors attribute this finding to students in the study and concluded that "computers have the capacity to deliver
being higher functioning and using their own study strate- motivating, individualized practice in concentrations far
gies prior to and during the study. Overall , use of mnemonic beyond those available in traditional instruction" (p. 162).
illustrations that provide meaningful visual links and Overall, research supports embedding text enhancements
acoustic cues for encoding and retrieval is a promising during instruction to promote reading comprehension and
approach for facilitating recall in the content areas, espe- recall of narrative and expository texts for students with LD.
cially science and social studies. Dependent on the content and learning objective, teachers
can use different text enhancements to (a) select and present
Study Guides important information, (b) make abstract information more
Teachers can also improve reading comprehension by meaningful, (c) visually represent the relationships between
preparing study guides that direct students' attention to crit- concepts, (d) direct students' attention to pertinent informa-
ical information in content area texts. Study guides typically tion, (e) individualize instruction, (f) provide memory cues
consist of vocabulary terms, a series of statements, short to facilitate recall, and (g) make the information load more
answer questions; a chapter summary, or an outline based on manageable for students. Consistently positive effects were
the main concepts, and they can be integrated during or after noted for use of various text enhancements-graphic orga-
instruction to support student learning. Lovitt and colleagues nizers, story maps, mnemonic illustrations, study guides,
conducted several studies to determine the effect of study and computer assisted instruction.
guides for facilitating text comprehension. Teacher directed
study g uides that seq ue nced the main ideas significantly
COGNITIVE AND METACOGNITIVE STRATEGIES
increased comprehension of science content for seventh
graders (Lovi tt, Rudsit, Jenkin s, Pious, & Benedetti, 1986) According to Rosenshine (1995), a cognitive strategy is
and for high school students with LD (Bergerud, Lovitt, & "a heuristic or guide that serves to support or facilitate the
Horton, 1988). In both studies, students in the study guide learner as she or he develops the internal procedures that
condition outperformed students in the self-study condi- enable them to perform the hi gher level operations [such as
tion. These findings were replicated using computerized reading comprehension]" (p. 266). Cognitive strategies, sin-
study guides (Horton, Lovitt, Givens, & Nelson, 1989) and gle or multiple, have been shown to help students with LD
hypertext study guides (Horton, Boone, & Lovitt, 1990) for learn from text. Single strategies reported in the literature
social studies content with high school students with LD. include recognizing text structure, cognitive mapping, ques-
Study guides can also be successfully implemented in tioning, identifying main ideas, and summarization. Multiple
6 FOCUS ON EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN APRIL 2011

strategies develop different kinds of thinking and include setting, characters, goal, problem, plot or action, resolution,
Reciprocal Teaching and its variants such as Collaborative and a theme (Baumann & Bergeron, 1993; Morrow, 1996;
Strategic Reading (CSR) and POSSE (Predict, Organize, and Pressley et al., 1990). Given that students with LD do
Search, Summarize, Evaluate), as well as SQ3R (Survey, not have as well developed a sense of story grammar as their
Question, Read, Recite, Review). Even though these strate- nondisabled peers and often have trouble recalling elements
gies cultivate different comprehension skills, they include of a story, particularly the more abstract elements such as
several common goals and components. First, a common theme and resolution, several interventions have focused on
goal of the different cognitive strategies is to teach students teaching story grammar to improve their reading compre-
how to interact with the content so that learning becomes hension. Specifically, these studies have shown that directly
more deliberate, self-directed, and self-regulated. Second, teaching story grammar can highlight important relations,
all cognitive strategies require the student to read the text, which, in turn, leads to a deeper understanding of the story.
ask questions, draw connections, find main ideas, clarify Using advanced reading material (i.e., literature), for exam-
meaning, reread, and paraphrase or summarize key infor- ple, Dimino, Gersten, Carnine, and Blake (1990) directly
mation. A third component is that the instructional method taught an interactive comprehension strategy based on story
(direct instruction) used in cognitive strategy training grammar that provided opportunities for secondary students,
emphasizes effective principles of instructional design including students with LD, to "clarify and discuss impor-
(e.g., clear description of the strategy, teacher modeling, tant elements of the story as they read" (p. 29). The complex
corrective feedback, guided and independent practice). In stories involved detailed character information (clues and
contrast, metacognition is the ability to think about and reaction), the presence of more than one problem that may
reflect on one's thinking. Students with LD often have dif- require several attempts, a resolution, a complication or a
ficulty thinking about whether they understand what they twist, and a theme. Students who received the intervention
are reading and do not know how or when to use strategies showed greater gains in comprehension compared to stu-
that will help them understand what they are reading. dents who were not exposed to the intervention. Although
Therefore, instruction in metacognition or metacognitive the success of this intervention for students with LD is not
skillfulness-"the procedural knowledge to actually use clear, given that results were not disaggregated for students
metacognition" (Martini & Shore, 2008, p. 243)-is an with LD, the study by Gurney, Gersten, Dimino, and Car-
important consideration for students with LD to use com- nine ( 1990) using a similar approach provided evidence that
prehension strategies independently. these students' comprehension of important elements in lit-
erature anthologies can be improved as a function of story
Text Structure grammar instruction.
Teaching students to identify a text's organizational Story grammar interventions that emphasized metacogni-
structure is critical for comprehending and remembering tion (recognizing when and how to apply the story grammar
content, because awareness of text structure can aid in strategy) seem to improve students' reading comprehensio n
extracting and constructing meaning while reading (Shana- (Carnine & Kinder, 1985; Faggella-Luby, Schumaker, &
han et al., 2010). It is important for students to recognize the Deschler, 2007; Griffey, Zigmond, & Leinhart, 1988; Ther-
distinction between the two genres (narrative and informa- rien, Wickstrom, & Jones, 2006). The study conducted by
tional) of text structure as they use them to "build their Carnine and Kinder (1985) with upper elementary students
understanding and recall of key points" (p. 17). For instance, with LD indicated that directly teaching them how to ask
understanding that narrative texts (e.g., historical fiction, questions about story elements improved their comprehen-
fables, autobiographies) typically tell a story depicting a sion. Although the study by Griffey et al. ( 1988) found that
sequence of events that involve characters helps students to story grammar intervention alone or used along with a self-
"distinguish between major and minor events and predict monitoring strategy showed modest pretest to posttest gains
how a story might unfold" (p. 17). Informational texts, in for students with LD in grades 3 through 5, it did not lead to
contrast, consist of expository writing (e.g., news articles, better comprehension than teaching students to question
speeches) and "communicate information so that the reader themselves about the text. It appears that the four sessions of
might learn something" (Weaver & Kintsch, 1991/1996, p. instruction in this study may not have been sufficient for stu-
230). dents with LD, who often need more time to realize gains in
reading comprehension.
Narrative Texts More recently, the use of story grammar instruction along
Story grammar (or story schema) represents the structure with question generation (Therrien et al., 2006) and self-
of narrative texts. The structural elements (story grammar) questioning before reading (Faggella-Luby et al., 2007)
common to most narrative texts include, for example, the have been found to be effective in improving the reading
 7

comprehension performance of students with LD. Over a 4- school students with LD and those with mild cognitive dis-
month period, Therrien et al. (2006) successfully taught stu- abilities were taught to independently construct cognitive
dents with LD in grades 4 through 8 how to use a cue card maps (including a Venn diagram, a specific type of cognitive
with generic story structure questions to answer factual and map to compare and contrast main ideas) from reading pas-
inferential questions. Faggella-Luby et al. (2007) examined sages. Using a mnemonic, students were prompted to iden-
the effectiveness of an Embedded Story Structure (ESS) tify and link the main ideas with the supporting details. Fol-
Routine, an intervention that incorporated effective compo- lowing the intervention, students in the study by Boyle
nents of instruction (e.g., advance organizer, modeling, cor- (1996) who were exposed to the cognitive mapping strategy
rective feed back) and essential story elements with high showed improvements in both literal and inferential com-
school students with LD. The success of the intervention in prehension skills. However, this success did not transfer to
improving student comprehension may be attributed not performance on a standardized reading comprehension
only to the careful design of the intervention but also to the assessment. In contrast, students in the later Boyle (2000)
intensive instruction (17 hours) that students received. study improved on measures of literal comprehension and
relational comprehension more than they improved on infer-
Informational Texts ential comprehension. It appears that teaching students to
Informational texts have a variety of text structures (e.g., use cognitive maps is useful when the details and relation-
compare-contrast, sequence, cause-effect, description) that ships in the diagrams are made explicit.
can be challenging for students with LD. As such, teachers Recall that cognitive strategies teach students how to
can selectively provide instruction on common informa- interact with the content so that learning becomes more
tional text structures (e.g., compare-contrast). At the same deliberate, self-directed, and self-regulated in contrast to
time, it is critical that "teachers use familiar ideas or topics text enhancements that allow teachers to select, organize,
when teaching students about the structure of informational and present difficult to understand material and make the
text, and initially use texts that provide clear, easy-to-recog- text more meaningful and accessible. As such, the story
nize examples of the structure" (Shanahan et al., 2010, p. mapping intervention in the well-designed study conducted
19). For instance, a teacher could model a compare-contrast by Johnson, Graham, and Harris (1997) would be deemed a
text on pilgrims and Native Americans or different types of cognitive strategy, because it focused on students construct-
rocks and have the students make a table or diagram to ing their own story map using story grammar elements. In
depict the similarities and differences. Smith and Friend this study, all students with LD in grades 4 through 6 made
(1986), for example, conducted a study that taught high gains following the completion of the intervention (story
school students with LD to recognize and use five different mapping strategy only, with goal-setting, with self-instruc-
text structures (time-order, problem/solution, comparison, tion, with both goal-setting and self-instruction); however,
description, and cause-effect) to guide their comprehension students who received story mapping with both goal setting
of expository prose. Following the intervention, students and self-instruction improved the most in story grammar
could recognize the different text structures and recall the recall. Students with LD whose performance was far below
main ideas. Similarly, Bakken , Mastropieri, and Scruggs that of their nondisabled peers prior to the intervention
( 1997) used a text structure based strategy to teach eighth- improved such that their performance following the inter-
grade students with LD to identify three kinds of text struc- vention was comparable.
tures (i.e., main ide·a, list, and order) in science passages and
apply structure specific strategies to study passages. The Questioning
intervention not only resulted in improved performance on This approach is known to pro.m ote comprehension by
recall measures but also led to transfer to untrained social teaching students how to activate prior knowledge, sum-
studi es passages. Therefore, it is encouraging that text struc- marize text, and check their understanding of the material
ture-based strategies can be successfully taught to students (Mastropieri, Scruggs, Bakken, & Whedon, 1996). A
with LD to improve their comprehension. questioning strategy that taught students to ask them-
selves questions as they interacted with the text to find
Cognitive Mapping/Story Mapping main ideas, generate related questions, and monitor under-
Students with LD are not as likely as their peers to iden- standing of textual units has been shown to be effective
tify and visually represent main ideas that are known to for enhancing the comprehension performance of eighth-
facilitate comprehension. As such, teaching these students a and ninth-grade students with LD (Wong & Jones, 1982).
cognitive mapping or story mapping strategy can help them Another effective questionin g approach is the Question
visualize what is described in the text. In two separate stud- Answer Relationships (QARs) strategy that has been used
ies conducted by Boyle ( 1996, 2000), middle and hi gh to help students in grades 1 through 9 to com prehend
8 FOCUS ON EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN APRIL 2011

information in social studies text (Simmonds, 1992). In Students with LD frequently struggle with identifyi ng
this approach, students learn to differentiate among three the main idea in reading passages, and the challenge is
kinds of comprehension questions, 'Right There' (literal more pronounced with content area texts. Several
question), 'Think and Search' (text implicit-text-based researchers have successfully used direct instruction pri n-
inference question) and 'On My Own' (script implicit- ciples of teacher modeling, guided practice, and corrective
prior knowledge-based inference question). Such an feedback to help students identify or construct the mai n
approach would allow students to draw inferences from idea of texts. Jenkins, Heliotis, Stein, and Haynes (198 7)
information in text that is missing or not explicitly stated taught elementary school students with LD to restate the
(Shanahan et al., 2010). most important idea for each paragraph in a narrative. To
The use of elaborative interrogation is another helpful generate a restatement, students learned to ask themselves
comprehension-building strategy that Mastropieri, Scruggs, two questions, "who" the paragraph was about and "what's
Hamilton, et al. (1996) have used to teach seventh- and happening." Results supported the usefulness of writing
eighth-grade students to actively reason through the infor- restatements of important ideas to improve reading com-
mation in prose passages containing science facts by ques- prehension.
tioning each science fact and generating an explanation for Other studies that focused on a paraphrasing or restate-
it. When compared to traditional instruction, the elaborative ment strategy combined with self-questioning procedures
interrogation strategy significantly increased student pro- also produced similar results. Ellis and Graves (1990) taught
vided explanations for the facts but not recall of facts. Ques- upper elementary and middle school (grades 5-7) students
tioning strategies that facilitate critical thinking skills are to ask themselves, "What is the main idea of the para-
also important to cultivate for students with LD. Darch and graph?" and to state the main ideas in prose passages in the ir
Kame'enui (1987), for example, conducted a study in which own words. In comparison to repeated reading procedures,
they directly taught fourth to sixth grade students with LD paraphrasing instruction resulted in improved comprehen-
to detect invalid arguments in texts. They were taught three sion and maintenance of strategy effects. Wong and Jones
specific skills: detect faulty generalizations, detect false ( 1982) taught students with LD in grades 8 and 9 a self-
causality, and detect invalid testimonials. At the completion questioning approach to interact with the text to come up
of the intervention, the effect size comparing students who with "a paraphrased version of the main idea" (p. 231 ). Fol-
were taught critical thinking skills to students who were not lowing the training, student comprehension improved, espe-
exposed to this approach were large on a measure that cially in terms of increased awareness of important tex tual
assessed knowledge of three critical reading skills (argu- units and ability to generate questions related to those units.
ment analysis, embedded argument analysis, skill classifica- In the Bakken et al. (1997) study, eighth-grade students who
tion). However, the effects were not realized on a reading were taught to apply a paragraph restatement strategy to sci-
comprehension measure. ence passages involving three types of text structures (mai n
idea, list, order) improved their performance on immediate
Main Idea Instruction and delayed recall measures, and they transferred the strat-
According to Williams ( 1988), the ability to find the egy to social studies.
main idea is "the basis for being able to draw appropriate Researchers have also combined principles of direct
inferences from the text, to study effectively, and to read instruction with self-monitoring procedures to teach main
critically" (p. 2). In other words, getting the main idea from ideas with considerable success. Graves (1986) compared
a text is central to reading comprehension (van den Broek, two approaches to main idea instruction-direct instruction
Lynch, Naslund, levers-Landis, & Verduin, 2003). It is and direct instruction plus self-monitoring. Students in
important to note that the nature of the main idea differs grades 5 through 8 were taught a rule to find main ideas ("a
between narrative and expository text types (see Baumann, main idea tells what the whole story is about," p. 94 ). Stu-
1986; Moore, Cunningham, Rudisill, 1983; Pearson & John- dents in the direct instruction and self-monitoring group
son, 1978). In narrative texts, the reader has to discern the were taught to stop twice during reading, to self-question
theme of a story from the description of events and their their understanding of the main idea, and to place a check
temporal sequence. In contrast, expository text requires the mark on a self-monitoring card. Results indicated improve-
reader to develop a generalization or a thesis based on the ment in both groups' comprehension performance in com-
logical relationship of ideas about a topic. Given the differ- parison to a control condition; the self-monitoring compo-
ent genres within expository prose (e.g., description, com- nent had an added value in increasing comprehension of
pare-contrast, sequence, cause-effect, problem- solution), main ideas. In a related study, Graves and Levin (1989) doc-
the main idea or what is important may be defined by a spe- umented that self-monitoring of main ideas was more effec-
cific genre (Williams, 1988, 2004 ). tive than a mnemonic condition for discerning main ideas in
 9

texts. Similarly, Jitendra, Cole, Hoppes, and Wilson (1998) documented on comprehension of science text for five stu-
affirmed the positive effects of direct instruction and self- dents with LD in grades 4 through 8 (Nelson, Smith, &
monitoring fo r identifying main ideas in passages for three Dodd, 1992).
6th-grade students with LD. Different from the rule-governed approach to summary
In essence, research supports main idea instruction using instruction, Malone and Mastropieri (1992) instructed mid-
principles of direct instruction combined with self-question- dle school students with LD to ask questions about the sub-
ing or self- monitoring procedures to increase comprehen- ject of each paragraph and the related action and to use the
sion skills. Main idea instruction resulted in improved out- information to write a summary sentence. Students were
comes on comprehension measures on both narrative and also taught to use a self-monitoring card to check applica-
expository texts for students with LD in grades 5 through 9. tion of the strategy. Students in both groups, summarization
Additionall y, in some studies, main idea instruction resulted and summarization with self-monitoring, outperformed stu-
in maintenance and transfer. dents in the self-study group on reading comprehension
measures. Students also trained in the self-monitoring com-
Summarization ponent successfully transferred the strategy from narrative
Summarization training that emphasizes the "structure of to social studies passages. Similarly, !itendra, Hoppes, and
ideas within text and how individual ideas relate to each Xin (2000) assessed the effectiveness of combining self-
other" (Rinehart, Stahl, & Erikson, 1986, p. 424) is likely to monitoring with a summarization strategy. Middle school
lead to greater recall and retention of text. Summarizing students were taught to identify and generate main idea sen-
requires students to draw upon their prior knowledge to per- tences that summarized the passage in addition to using a
form a series of cognitive operations on the information that self-monitoring procedure for comprehension. Results indi-
is read : evaluate to determine whether the information is cated that instruction resulted in improved comprehension
important enough to include in a summary, condense to performance, which was maintained 6 weeks after training.
combi ne important idea units, and transform to present the Further, transfer effects to novel passages were found on
gist in " their own words." The greater attention to text dur- selection items, but the effects were less robust on produc-
ing summari zation results in students more closely monitor- tion of responses, possibly as a result of a higher readability
ing and evaluating their reading to comprehend text. As a level and more implicit idea units in the transfer passages as
consequence, summarization training has a reciprocal effect compared to the training passages.
on improving "students' metacognitive control of the read- The studies by Gajria and Salvia (1992), Jitendra et al.
ing process" (p. 424). The goal of summarization training (2000), Malone and Mastropieri ( 1992), and Nelson et al.
should ma~e students aware of the highest level of informa- (1992), are of great importance because they facilitated the
tion or main ideas in a text as well as details that support the construction of meaning from text by teaching summariza-
mai n ideas, because both are critical to remember for school tion skills rather than simply identifying main ideas. As
success. summarization is a complex skill that students do not use
Many studies have examined the value of summarizing naturally while reading, explicit instruction in summariza-
as a comprehension strategy. Gajria and Salvia ( 1992) used tion, preferably with a self-monitoring component, is essen-
a direct instruction approach to teach students with LD in tial. Summarization instruction enhanced students' ability to
grades 6 through 9 to develop a summary or gist of the main effectively summarize both narrative and expository text
ideas of a passage by applying the five rules proposed by and resulted in improved comprehension and recall , with
Brown and Day- ( 1983): reduce lists, select topic sentences, robust maintenance and transfer effects.
construct topic sentences, delete redundancies, and delete
unimportant information . After each rule was mastered in Multiple strategy instruction
isolation , students received instruction and guided practice As Shanahan et al. (2010) noted, "multiple-strategy
in the combined use of the rules. Figure 2 presents a prompt instruction might be more complicated initially, but it famil-
sheet used for instruction in a summarization strategy. Grad- iarizes students with using the strategies together from the
ually, students assumed increasing responsibility for apply- very beginning, providing a more authentic, strategic read-
ing the rules to construct passage summaries. Instruction ing experience" (p. 13). Based on research with students
results were positive: Students taught to summarize outper- with LD, reciprocal teaching and its variants are key exam-
formed students in the comparison condition on comprehen- ples of multipl e-strategy formats that combine various
sion measures, maintained the skill, and demonstrated gains strategies . An other multiple strategy approach involves ver-
on the comprehension subtest of the Gates-MacGinitie, a bal rehearsal strategies such as SQ3R (Survey, Question ,
standardized reading assessment. Similar positive effects of Read , Re~ite, Revi ew) and its adaptations (e.g., multipass
explicit instruction in rul e-governed summ ary skill s were strategy).
10 FOCUS ON EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN APRIL 2011

General Steps to Form a Summary

• Understand the passage - First, read the title to help you know what the passage is about. Then, read the passage
slowly and ask yourself, "What is the general idea of this passage? What is the writer telling in this passage?" Try to say
the general idea in your own words.
• Check the passage - Reread the passage to make sure you got the general theme. Then, apply the five summarization
rules.

Rules for Writing a Summary ·

1. Reduce lists - If you come across a list of things in a passage, try to think of a word or a phrase that best describes the
list of things. For example, if a list of items includes apples, peaches, grapes, plums, and strawberries, you could catego-
rize the items in this list as fruits. Underline the list of items and write the category name for the list of items in the pas-
sage.
2. Cross out repeated information - Sometimes, information in a passage may be repeated. That is, the same thing may be
said again in a different way in the same passage. So, keep one sentence and get rid of the repeated statements by cross-
ing them out with a red pen.
3. Select a topic sentence - Often authors write a sentence that gives the main idea of the passage. This is called a topic
sentence. It is often the first sentence or last sentence in the paragraph. Read once again each paragraph of the passage.
Try to say the main idea of each paragraph to yourself. Next, search for the topic sentence in the paragraph. If the author
gives the topic sentence, underline it, and say it in your own words.
4. Write your own topic sentence - Sometimes the author does not write a topic sentence for a paragraph. Make up your
own topic sentence for each paragraph that does not have one. Write your topic sentence in the margin. Use your topic
sentences in your summary.
5. Cross out unimportant details - Sometimes passages contain unimportant or unnecessary details that do not deal
directly with the general theme of a passage. Get rid of this information. Cross out unimportant sentences with a blue
pen.

Check Your Work

• Have you underlined all lists in the passage and written a category name for each list?
• Do you have a topic sentence for each paragraph?
• Did you cross out information that is repeated?
• Did you cross out information that is not important?
• Have you applied the five rules to each paragraph in the passage?

Now use your marked passage to write a summary. Use connecting words ( e.g., "and," "so," "or") to join sentences. You
can also join the paragraphs together. Try to say the information in your own words.

Source: From "Main Idea and Summarization Instruction to Improve Reading Comprehension" (p. 213), by A. K. Jitendra, &
M . Gajria (2011) in R. O'Connor and P. Vadasy (Eds.), The Handbook of Reading Interventions. New York: Guilford Press.

FIGURE 2. Prompt Sheet for Summarization Instruction

Reciprocal Teaching strategies that are first modeled by the teacher. As such,
peer mediation and student discourse are used to scaffold
Developed by Palincsar and Brown (1986), reciprocal instruction for students with LD. The findings of two stud-
teaching that consists of four strategies- predicting, clarify- ies that examined the effectiveness of reciprocal teaching
ing, questioning, and summarizing- helps students to build for students with LD are mixed. On the Gates-MacGinite
on and monitor their own comprehension. In this approach, standardized reading subtest, middle school students with
students in small groups take turns assuming the role of the LD trained in summarizing, questioning, clarifying, and
teacher and leading a discu ssion of the text using the four predicting in the study by Labercane and Battle (] 987) did
 11

not perform any better than students who did not receive SQ3R
instruction in the four strategies. In contrast, elementary The use of verbal rehearsal strategies is helpful in
school students, including students with LD in grades 4 to 6 improving students' reading comprehension competence.
inclusive classrooms, who received the strategy instruction With this learning strategy approach, the teacher first
in the study conducted by Lederer (2000) performed better describes and models each strategy, fo11owed by students
than their counterparts who did not receive such instruction rehearsing orally and practicing implementing each strategy
in answering short questions, generating questions, and using selected texts, and finally the teacher provides feed-
composing summaries. One plausible explanation for the back to students. McCormick and Cooper ( 1991 ), for exam-
contradictory results may be attributed to the different mea- ple, conducted a study in which they directly taught sec-
sures (distal or proximal to the intervention) used to assess ondary students with LD to use SQ3R, which prompted
comprehensi on. students to survey the text for clues, ask text-related ques-
Variations of reciprocal teaching have been used in some tions , read the text to find answers, paraphrase (recite) the
studies with considerable success. For example, collabora- answers found in the text, and review the information in the
tive strategic reading (CSR), an adaptation of reciprocal text. Across a series of three studies, the effects of SQ3R
teaching includes four strategies: preview, click and clunk, were not found for literal comprehension as measured by
get the gist, and wrap up. Students are taught to apply these retelling. However, the percentages of retelling were
strategies before reading (i.e., preview by connecting the strongly related to the length of the text read, with higher
topic with what is already known and predict what will be percentages of recall found for shorter than longer passages.
learned about the topic), during reading (e.g., monitor com- It must be noted that an adaptation of SQ3R, Multipass
prehension and use fix-up strategies to decipher unknown (survey, size-up, and sort-out), produced robust effects on
words or phrases [referred to as the click and clunk strategy] content tests for secondary students with LD using instruc-
and identify the most important ideas in the text to get the tional level texts (Schumaker, Deshler, Alley, Warner, &
gist) and after reading (wrap up-generate questions and Denton, 1982). The strategies were used to (a) familiarize
review key ideas learned). Klingner, Vaughn, Arguelles, students with the main ideas and organization of the chapter
Hughes, and Leftwich (2004) successfully used CSR to teach (survey), (b) gain specific information from the text without
fourth grade students with LD to learn from social studies reading the entire text (size-up) , and (c) have students test
text. Students who received instruction in the four strategies themselves on the material in the text (sort-out). Following
made greater gains in reading comprehension than students the implementation of Multipass, students were also able to
who received traditional instruction in the same content. generalize their strategy use on grade-level materials.
Using reciprocal teaching formats (i.e., extensive teacher In sum, research supports instruction in cognitive and
modeling of strategies followed by a gradual transfer of metacognitive strategies for students with LD. For both
strategy control to students), Englert and Mariage (1991) narrative and informational texts, instruction in a specific
taught upper elementary students with LD several strategies strategy or a combination of strategies-awareness of text
cued by the acronym POSSE (Predict, Organize, Search, structure, cognitive mapping, questioning, main ideas, and
Summarize, and Evaluate). Prereading strategies in the summarization-consistently resulted in improved compre-
POSSE instruction were predicting (i.e., activating back- hension performance. Though less frequently, long-term
ground knowledge) and organizing ideas based on text maintenance and transfer of strategy effects were also noted.
structure, whereas the remaining three strategies (search and Strategy instruction helps students with LD to be more pur-
summarize main ideas based on text structure, evaluate poseful in their reading, to actively interact with the text,
comprehension) were during-reading strategies. Researchers determine the author's message, construct meaning, and mon-
developed several materials to scaffold student learning. For itor their own understanding-efficient reading processes
example, a strategy sheet was used "to make visible to stu- demonstrated by strategic readers. For effective strategy
dents both the strategies and the text structures for perform- instruction, it appears that not only use of clear descriptions of
ing the reading process" (p. 126), and cue cards were used the strategy and teacher modeling followed by student verbal
"to prompt the self-talk and inner language related to a par- rehearsal , practice, and extensive feedback is critical , but also
ticular reading strategy, such as predicting, organizing, selecting instructional level texts is necessary to enhance
searching, summarizing, and evaluating" (p. 127). This reading comprehension for students with LD.
well-designed intervention led to students using the POSSE
strategy outperforming students who received traditional
instruction in the same text on all comprehension measures: ASSESSMENT OF READING COMPREHENSION
total free recall of ideas, recall of main ideas, overall orga- Reading comprehen sion assessment should focu s on
ni zation of recalls, and strategy knowledge. helpin g students learn and helping teachers teach. As such ,
12 FOCUS ON EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN APRIL 2011

we discuss assessment in terms of monitoring student assessing comprehension. Using the story map as a guide, a
progress in meeting lesson objectives and long-term goals teacher can determine whether the student can concisely
and making instructional decisions (e.g., planning tasks to describe important information related to the main charac-
foster student understanding). Assessment tasks that provide ter, setting, conflicts, key events, resolution, and theme, if
teachers and students with ongoing feedback concerning any might be present or inferred. Further, assessment tasks
their progress in the reading curriculum should be based pri- should determine whether students can proceed from identi-
marily on the classroom reading materials. Measuring stu- fying or generating main ideas in expository paragraphs to
dents' general comprehension to make instructional deci- summarizing important ideas in longer passages of content
sions would require collecting data frequently using a area texts written at the students' instructional level. The
variety of topics, texts (e.g., textbooks, anthologies, trade- assessment tasks may include having students list a topic
books), and tasks (Taylor, Harris, Pearson, & Garcia, 1995). and write the main idea sentence for each of several sections
To assess general comprehension, assessment tasks should of a text or summarize a few important ideas for a section
not only focus on the product (right or wrong response) but (e.g., a page) of the text rather than stating the main idea for
also on the reading comprehension process (e.g., how stu- each paragraph in the section. Summaries can be scored for
dents are thinking or using and developing ideas). the important ideas and supporting details expressed as
In general, making judgments about students' compre- opposed to trivial details. Figure 3 presents a rubric that
hension of specific material requires first assessing their teachers can use to evaluate students' summaries.
background knowledge of the reading material. The extent Although understanding students' comprehension is
of students' background knowledge (high, moderate, low) important, it is equally critical to assess students ' metacog-
can differentially influence comprehension of material to be nitive awareness related to use of comprehension strategies.
read. Questions are the most common techniques used to The assessment, therefore, should determine the extent to
assess comprehension. However, good questions should be which students understand the text they are reading (i.e. , the
framed to focus on important ideas rather than trivial details. clicks and clunks of comprehension), are able to detect their
Given that many students with LD have difficulty with free sources of comprehension difficulty, and use appropriate
response questions, timed assessment, and written responses, fix-up strategies to resolve comprehension problems (Taylor
these are factors that should be considered when using ques- et al., 1995). Tools to assess students' ability to monitor and
tions to assess these students' reading comprehension. When control their comprehension process may include question-
evaluating students' ability to comprehend narrative or naires (e.g., When you are reading and do not understand the
expository text, it is important to use instructional level text. text, what do you do? What do you do to help you remem-
Alternatives to asking students questions based on the text ber what you have read?), observations, interviews, or think-
to assess their comprehension might include having students alouds (Taylor et al., 1995).
generate questions, choose the best questions among a set of
choices, or select the best summary of a narrative or expos-
CONCLUSION
itory material from among several choices. In addition,
assessment tasks should focus on evaluating students' literal For teachers working with students with LD, there
and inferential comprehension using the QARs approach appears to be some guidance for providing remedial read-
described earlier with both narrative and expository text ing comprehension instruction. The increased emphasis
written at the students' instructional level. Finally, students' not only on "scientifically-based research," but also "ade-
inference processing ability when reading can be assessed quate yearly progress" as it relates to NCLB has led to sys-
using probing questions. Such questions would allow the tematic inquiry into the type of strategies that enhance text
teacher to delve deeper into students' initial answers by ask- comprehension and assessment to monitor student
ing them to explain how they conceptualized the particular progress in the instructional materials. Developing the
answers or asking students why one answer might be better comprehension skills of students with LD requires that
than another from several possible answers provided (Tay- instruction focus on both text enhancement strategies as
lor et al., 1995). The information generated from such ques- well as cognitive and metacognitive strategies.
tioning would enable the teacher to understand and evaluate In general, the evidence suggests that text enhancements
a student's inferencing ability (e.g., answers text-based such as graphic organizers, story maps, mnemonic illustra-
inference question or "think and search" QAR, but unable to tions, and study guides are promising instructional devices
answer "on my own" QAR) and provide the necessary sup- that teachers can integrate in a lesson to scaffold student
port to improve their comprehension. learning. Text enhancements make the learning material more
In addition to the questioning approach, asking students concrete and meaningful and thereby engage students with
to retell a story (oral or written) is an important means of LD who often struggle to access information independently
 13

Indicator Below Standard Approaching Standard At Standard

Complete Included one or two facts Partial summary with some Adept summary with most
important ideas, a few facts ideas, details, facts, and
important vocabulary

Correct Main idea is not expressed; Main idea is partially Main idea is clearly
it may include incorrect expressed; it may include expressed; all facts included
information misinterpretation are correct

Precise Included extra unimportant Included some extra No un5mportant details

details; repeated ideas unimportant details, or included; ideas not repeated
repeated few ideas

Quality of Writing Generally written as Generally written in own Written in own words,
"copied text" with some words, may be presented as flows smoothly from one
own words a list of disconnected ideas idea to another

Source: Adapted from Comprehension shouldn't be silent: From strategy instruction to student independence (p. 161 ), by M.
J., Kelley & N. Clausen-Grace (2007), Newark, DE: International Reading Association.

FIGURE 3. Summarizing Rubric

from teacher lecture or texts. In contrast to text enhance- Bakken, J. P., Mastropieri, M.A., & Scruggs, T. E. (1997). Reading
ments that address students' acquisition and mastery of spe- comprehension of expository science material and students with
learning disabilities: A comparison of strategies. The Journal (?{
cific content information, the focus of instruction in cogni-
Special Education, 31, 300-324.
tive and metacognitive strategies is on teaching students Baumann, J. F. (1986). Teaching main idea comprehension. Newark,
how to learn. Explicit instruction in a single cognitive strat- DE: International Reading Association.
egy (e.g., main idea, questioning, summarizing) or an inte- Baumann, J. F., & Bergeron, B. S. (1993). Story map instruction using
grated combination of strategies (e.g., reciprocal teaching, children's literature: Effects on first graders' comprehension of cen-
tral narrative elements. Journal Reading Behavior, 25, 407-437.
SQ3R) can help students with LD acquire reading processes
Bergerud, D., Lovitt, T. C., & Horton, S. (1988). The effectiveness of
proven effective across content areas. Continued use of cog- textbook adaptations in life science for high school students with
nitive strategies helps students with LD transition from pas- learning disabilities. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 21, 70- 76.
sive readers to self-directed readers who actively engage Boon, R. T., Burke, M. D., & Fore, C, III. (2006). The impact of cog-
with the lecture or text to construct meaning and improve nitive organizers and technology-based practices on student suc-
performance on classroom-based and standardized compre- cess in secondary social studies classrooms. Journal <i Special
Education Technology, 21(1), 5-15.
hension assessments.
Boon, R. T., Burke, M. D., Fore, C., & Hagan-Burke, S. (2006). Improv-
ing student content knowledge in inclusive social studies classrooms
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