The Science of Teaching Reading Comprehension: Evaluating Our Progress Since Durkin’s Seminal Study

• In Event: The Science of Teaching Reading Part 1: Educator Knowledge, Professional Development, and Student Reading Achievement

Abstract

Nearly fifty years ago, Durkin (1978-1979) conducted a seminal observation study of reading comprehension teaching during reading and social studies instruction provided by teachers in Grades 3 through 6. Durkin found that teachers provided some opportunities for students to read and assessed their reading comprehension ability. However, teachers almost never taught reading comprehension (i.e., less than 1% of the instructional time was coded as including teaching reading comprehension). Durkin’s findings were replicated in later research by Duffy and colleagues (1980). Durkin’s influential study inspired significant interest in reading comprehension instruction (e.g., Mosenthal et al., 1992; Vaughn & Wanzek, 2014). Since her study, we have gained substantial knowledge about reading theory and the science of teaching reading comprehension (Duke et al., 2021; Pearson & Cervetti, 2017). Still, there is no recent comprehensive review of reading observation research that examines the extent to which evidence-based practices for teaching students to comprehend text have translated to practice.
The purpose of this paper was to report findings from a systematic review of reading observation research K-12 students, describing the amount and quality of reading comprehension instruction occurring in schools since 1980. As a secondary goal, we also sought to explore potential associations between the amount and quality of reading comprehension practices observed in classrooms and student literacy outcomes. We systematically analyzed observational data from 69 studies and their connection to practices identified as evidence-based in What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) practice guides focused on reading (e.g., Foorman et al., 2016; Shanahan et al., 2010; Vaughn et al., 2022).
The findings indicated a substantial increase in the proportion of time dedicated to reading comprehension instruction compared to Durkin’s study. However, there was a strong emphasis on assessing reading comprehension rather than teaching it in a considerable number of studies (35%), which aligns with one of the main findings of the Durkin study. Many of the practices recommended for teaching reading comprehension in IES practice guides were frequently observed in the corpus of studies, such as comprehension strategy instruction (reported in 73% of studies), extended discussion of texts (77% of studies), developed students’ knowledge related texts (70% of studies). However, a majority of the practices for teaching reading comprehension identified by the WWC were observed in less than half of the observation studies reviewed. These practices included text structure instruction (38% of studies), developing engaging and motivating contexts for reading (20% of studies), providing text-based collaborative learning (21% of studies), and integrating writing opportunities to support comprehension (30% of studies). An insufficient number of studies examined the association between instructional practices and reading comprehension outcomes. These findings highlight the progress since Durkin’s study, while also revealing the significant gap between the practices frequently recommended for teacher reading comprehension and the instruction that is occurring in K-12 schools.

Authors

• Philip Capin, University of Texas at Austin

• Katlynn Dahl-Leonard, University of Virginia

• Colby Hall, University of Virginia

• Eunsoo Cho, University of California - Riverside

• Nayoung Yoon, University of Texas at Austin

• Eleni Chatzoglou, University of Texas at Austin

• Tim T. Andress, University of California - Irvine

• Sharon R. Vaughn, University of Texas at Austin