Effectiveness of Guided Practice during Remedial Reading Instruction: An Application of Computer-Managed Instruction

Abstract

This study investigated the effectiveness of the use of guided practice in teaching reading comprehension to middle-school students in remedial reading class. Teachers used a low-cost computer networking system to immediately assess and tabulate student performance to determine which segments of the curriculum required additional remediation. The reading curriculum consisted of two strands-QAR2 (a metacognitive strategy based on the work of Raphael) and rule-based inferences (a strategy for drawing inferences from material implicit in the text). Results indicated a significant effect for rule-based inferences, but not for QAR2. The effect was maintained over a 2-week period. Results indicated that immediate feedback was more useful in teaching the abstract and demanding rule-based inference curriculum than the easier, more familiar QAR2 curriculum. Students responded positively to the immediate feedback and the group accountability involved in the guided practice.