The Reading Group: An Experimental Investigation of a Labyrinth

Reported are two experiments with third-grade children in which a number of dimensions of reading instruction were investigated. The major findings: an emphasis on meaning produces better sentence recall than an emphasis on accurate oral reading; in groups receiving an accurate reading emphasis, but not groups receiving a meaning emphasis, sentence recall depends upon instructional time; the child who is taking an active turn remembers more sentences from a lesson than the children who are following along; and the interestingness of the material is a major factor in sentence recall, one that is much more important than readability.