Improving Content-Area Reading Using Instructional Graphics

Abstract

THE PURPOSE of this study was to provide an ecologically valid test of the effectiveness of using a particular type of instructional graphic on fourthand fifth-grade students' ability to learn from reading their social studies textbooks. The instructional graphic examined here was a frame, which is a visual representation of the organization of important ideas in a text. Six fourthand six fifth-grade teachers in the U.S. taught social studies using either frames or the instruction suggested in the teacher's edition of the regular classroom social studies textbook. The treatment was repeated in four rounds (four separate replications) during the school year. Each teacher and each student participated in both conditions in each round. The combined analysis of recall and recognition measures for all four rounds suggested that for fifth-grade but not necessarily for fourth-grade students, framing was a more effective instructional technique than was the instruction suggested in the teacher's edition. The study also demonstrates the benefits of conducting research as a collaboration between a university and schools.