We are beginning to collect data in a series of single-subject design studies about how different features of supported electronic text affect the text comprehension of students with learning disabilities.
We are beginning to collect data in a series of single-subject design studies about how different features of supported electronic text affect the text comprehension of students with learning disabilities. Students will be reading text from 8th grade social studies books. However, we found that we could not use standard text for our research conditions, as selections of text from the 8th grade texts we examined ranged in readability level from 6th to 12th grade.
Therefore, we spent the fall semester adapting a text, primarily by rewriting, in order to have 40 500-word samples of text at the 8th grade readability level. Each text section addresses a topic without relying on previous or subsequent sections for understanding, and each text section includes at least one historical term that is defined within the text itself.
Students will engage with these text selections in three conditions: (a) silent reading, (b) reading with a text-to-speech program on the computer, and (c) reading on the computer with a digitized audio version, read by a junior high school student. After reading a selection, the student will be asked to respond orally to 3 types of comprehension questions: (a) main idea, (b) vocabulary, and (c) details. The readability level of the questions also is controlled, and all are written at the 8th grade level. With generous support from Freedom Scientific, we are using WYNN software in the text-to-speech condition. Contingent upon the outcomes of this study, we will be examining other features of text-to-speech software in subsequent studies.
We are collecting data with two groups of 8th grade students who have learning disabilities. Because the impact of text-to-speech software is likely to vary with student characteristics, the first group includes students with poor reading fluency but strong listening comprehension. The second group includes students with poor reading fluency and low listening comprehension.