Doctor of Education (Educational Leadership), Youngstown State University, 2012, Department of Teacher Education and Leadership Studies

Read-aloud is a technique predominantly utilized at the elementary level. This study was designed to research the effectiveness of this technique at the middle school level, specifically, sixth grade students who were not receiving special education or additional reading intervention services. Until recently, research on read-aloud in the middle school has been limited. For the current investigation, students in two middle schools within the same school system in Virginia were tested using the Diagnostic Online Reading Assessment (DORA) during the fall of 2009 and again in the spring of 2010. Data from the pretest and posttest in the areas of reading comprehension and vocabulary were collected and analyzed using SPSS Version 18. Pretest and posttest raw scores, along with gender, were analyzed for reliability, and, correlational and multivariate analyses were conducted to examine for potential relationships and group differences. Qualitative data were gathered from anecdotal logs from the teachers from the treatment group and the researcher from fidelity checks throughout the research period. Information from teachers included: attendance, student reactions, lessons, and personal reflections. Researcher information included observations of teachers from control and treatment groups, and included information such as: types of questions asked, activities utilized, and demeanor/behavior of the students. This data was analyzed for trends to complement the quantitative data from the assessments. Significant findings and their implications are discussed.

Committee: Karen Larwin Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Karen Becker Ph.D. (Committee Member); Bob Beebe Ph.D. (Committee Member); Gail Saunders-Smith Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Education; Educational Tests and Measurements; Literacy; Middle School Education; Reading Instruction; Teacher Education; Teaching

Master of Arts, Wittenberg University, 2021, Education

The following study examined how using explicit vocabulary instruction during read alouds can impact the listening comprehension of first-grade students. The participants in this study consisted of 12 first grade students from a large public district in Central Ohio during the 2020-2021 school year. The study lasted for six weeks and used a single group interrupted time series design. I used descriptive and inferential statistics to determine if students made growth in their comprehension scores when they were provided with explicit vocabulary instruction compared to when they received no vocabulary instruction. Results from this study indicate that students have a higher comprehension during read alouds when they are provided with explicit vocabulary instruction compared to when they were provided no vocabulary instruction.

Committee: Amy McGuffey (Advisor); Missy McCoy (Committee Member); Brian Yontz (Committee Member); Kristin Farley (Committee Chair) Subjects: Education; Elementary Education

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2021, EDU Teaching and Learning

In this dissertation I examined the tensions and negotiations that arise during discussions about text when students develop different interpretations of what they read. The purpose of the investigation was to determine how intermediate students construct meaning through discussions about fictional texts portraying diverse and realistic hardships and struggles that these students may or may not have personal experience with. Critical encounters in discussions about literature are pivotal moments that can shift the way students talk about text, leading to a more critical discussion and a deeper understanding about social issues presented in the text. A secondary purpose was to determine how the teacher instruction about books mediated how students responded to those books. I used a diachronic single case study design in this investigation, collecting data over two school years in the same classroom where the teacher and the students looped for fourth and fifth grade. Data sources included: classroom observations, descriptive and reflective field notes, audio and video recordings, conceptual memos, classroom artifacts, and semi-structured interviews. Multiple strategies to analyze data included constant comparative analysis and the development of constructivist grounded theory. A discourse analysis coding scheme was used to determine how students interacted during literature circles and interactive read-alouds. I found that critical encounters occurred when the discussion transitioned from an inquiry discussion where students were free to express their divergent views, to a dialogic discussion, where the students took a more definitive stance, as they shared and considered the alternate perspectives of other students to construct an understanding of the world they live in, and through that create meaning for the text event portrayed in the realistic fiction novel. These students initiated critical encounters when their experiences through life had shaped their (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Linda Parsons P.Hd. (Advisor); Julia Hagge P.Hd. (Committee Member); Christine Warner P.Hd. (Committee Member) Subjects: Education; Elementary Education; Literature; Reading Instruction; Teaching

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2020, EDU Physical Activity and Educational Services

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of traditional, single vs. immediate repeated read-aloud on the listening comprehension of preschool-aged children. An alternating treatment design was used to assess the effects of single vs. multiple practice. The participants included four children, ages 4 years through 4 years 11 months. The study was conducted within a non-profit child development center. Children's comprehension of read-alouds was measured by number of factual and causal questions answered correctly as compared to a key. Visual analysis of level, trend, variability, immediacy of the effect, overlap, and consistency of data patterns across phases as well as means and mean differences were examined to determine interventions effects. Results demonstrated participants on average performed better when answering comprehension questions after the immediate repeated read-aloud intervention (M = 3.29) than answering comprehension questions after the single read-aloud intervention (M = 2.71). However, the magnitude of separation between averages and data points was small, and the consistency of separation between data points was poor. Additionally, participants answered more factual and causal questions correctly for immediate repeated read-aloud (M = 1.8 and M = 1.5, respectively) than factual and causal questions answered correctly for single read-aloud (M = 1.63 and M = 1.1, respectively). Furthermore, the improvement observed from single read-aloud to immediate repeated read-aloud was greater for causal questions (increase of M = 0.4, 36.4%) than for factual questions (increase of M = 0.17, 10.4%). Factual questions answered correctly, however, outperformed their counterparts within a given intervention for both single read-aloud and immediate repeated read-aloud. This study extends previous research on read-aloud interventions by comparing single read-aloud to the novel, immediate repeated read-aloud—both administered in traditional format. Foll (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Laurice Joseph Ph.D (Advisor); Sheila Alber-Morgan Ph.D, BCBA-D (Committee Member); Antoinette Miranda Ph.D (Committee Member) Subjects: Early Childhood Education; Preschool Education; Reading Instruction

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2017, EDU Teaching and Learning

Literacy standards in early childhood education have recently foregrounded emergent reading processes along with recommended oral language and literacy pedagogies that includes reading aloud informational and literary picturebooks (National Institute for Early Education Research, 2006). To understand how reading pedagogy makes a difference in children's learning, research is needed that describes the daily face-to-face interactions of young children and teachers as they engage in reading and storytelling practices. Literacy events like read alouds are examined for their efficiency in contributing to a student's language development but are rarely scrutinized as complex displays of discourse, identity, storytelling, and narrative that construct students as certain types of readers and members of a reading community. This dissertation describes an ethnographic case study, informed by narrative and discourse analysis theory and methods, which focused on how teachers and students interact with picturebooks in a pre-kindergarten classroom. Data for this study was documented for a period of five and a half months from February 2016 through June 2016. The entire data set included a total of 181 pieces of audio, video, field note, photo, transcript, memo, and interview data all recorded in a Data Log. The research was guided by the following questions: 1. In a specific pre-kindergarten context, what counts as reading? How do children's view of what counts as reading form over time and in various spaces? 2. How does reading aloud illuminate reading as a social practice in this context? How do the participants in classroom read aloud use storytelling in practice? 3. How is storytelling negotiated between the teacher and children (and among the children) to frame readers' identities and belonging? Results suggest that reading aloud invites students and teachers of this classroom to use language influenced by local and global discourse as they navigate storytelling in a w (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Patricia Enciso Ph.D. (Advisor) Subjects: Literacy

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2007, Psychology

The connectionist approach to reading aloud has been a serious challenge to the traditional dual-route theory, but several issues concerning the theoretical distinctions of the connectionist approach from the dual-route theory remain unresolved. First, through what kind of internal structure a single-route connectionist model represents the two seemingly distinct kinds of ability to process regularities and exceptions without relying on dual-route structure, has yet to be fully answered. Second, the question of whether the single-route connectionist model is indeed functionally a single mechanism is yet to be convincingly demonstrated. Third, whether a single-route model can simulate surface dylexia, of which the dual-route theory has been the only traditional interpretation, has not been thoroughly investigated. By taking a model from Plaut et al. (1996) and examining it closely, the present study attempts to resolve these issues. Various forms of network analysis demonstrate that the representational system in hidden unit space is structured in the same way regardless of learning regularities or exceptions. Further analyses about the effect of the reading network's exception learning upon its nonword reading reveal a proper viewpoint on the relationship between its regularity and exception learning. That is, ‘exception learning' in connectionist modeling of reading aloud does affect the model's nonword reading performance just as ‘noise capturing' in statistical modeling does the model's generalization. In reality, however, the severity of “ordinary exceptions” in normal word reading happens to be not high enough to ruin the network's nonword reading, as “noise” does in statistical modeling. These findings are also used to disprove the idea that the reading network may have developed a functional dual route. A careful interpretation of the findings shows not only that a hidden representation corresponding to the correct pronunciation of an exception word develops (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Jay Myung (Advisor) Subjects:

Master of Education (MEd), Bowling Green State University, 2010, Reading

Many school districts use a basal reading series to teach the various components of reading instruction to students. However, oftentimes a basal series can seem monotonous and does not encourage students to want to read and complete the work. Over the years, research studies have shown that many different reading instructional strategies are beneficial, but it is often a challenge for teachers to determine which will be the best for their classroom of students. However, it is known that classroom discussions about books facilitate learning. The benefits of teacher read-alouds and follow-up discussion, for example, have been widely researched. Additionally, in 1982, Karen Smith's fifth grade class began implementing literature circles (Daniels, 2002). More recently, teachers have begun to use literature circles within their classrooms, but some teachers are still apprehensive because they do not know whether they are as beneficial as the reading instruction/discussion strategies that they are already using. This investigation was designed to determine the impact of literature circles compared to read-alouds on reading comprehension and student reading motivation for second grade students. After collecting and analyzing the data over the course of four weeks, the researcher determined that there did not appear to be a difference between the literature circles and read-alouds in regard to reading comprehension. However, some of the scores did indicate that some students did benefit more form literature circles than read-alouds, and visa versa, but the data were mixed.

Committee: Nancy Fordham PhD (Committee Chair); Cindy Hendricks PhD (Committee Member); Cynthia Bertelsen PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Education; Elementary Education; Reading Instruction