Gerald G. Duffy

Moving From the Old to the New: Research on Reading Comprehension Instruction

This article is an attempt to integrate findings from research about comprehension processes, comprehension strategies, and teaching strategies in order to inform instructional practice in reading comprehension. The article begins with a discussion of traditional views about reading and how those views have shaped the current comprehension curriculum in American schools. A view of comprehension based on recent models of the reading process is presented next as a basis for reconceptualizing the comprehension curriculum as a set of five effective comprehension strategies. From research on teaching comes a foundation for establishing a new view of instruction, one that focuses on the negotiation of meaning among students and teachers through teachers’ instructional actions. Instructional recommendations, based on the research synthesized in this article, and questions for future research bring the article to a close.

Beyond Knowledge: Exploring Why Some Teachers Are More Thoughtfully Adaptive Than Others

As teacher educators, we have observed that knowledge alone does not lead to the kinds of thoughtful teaching we strive for. Puzzled by differences in the teaching practices of teacher candidates having similar professional knowledge, we explore what might account for these differences. We address what is necessary, beyond traditional forms of professional knowledge, to support the development of thoughtful teachers who are responsive to students and situations. We provide four perspectives, each drawn from areas in which we conduct our research, and suggest a need to move beyond knowledge in teacher education. Our aim is to explore questions about preparing thoughtful teachers and to challenge others to do the same. We postulate that self-knowledge and a sense of agency with the intent of purposefully negotiating personal and professional contexts may be as important, if not more important, than the more traditional conceptions of professional knowledge.

The Relationship between Explicit Verbal Explanations during Reading Skill Instruction and Student Awareness and Achievement: A Study of Reading Teacher Effects.

PREVIOUS RESEARCH has established that good readers, in contrast to poor readers, are aware of how to use reading comprehension strategies, and that an adjunct curriculum in how to use such strategies can result in achievement gains. However, it is not known whether teachers can, as a part of the regular instructional program for students in low reading groups, develop awareness of how to be strategic and, as a result, improve learning outcomes. The experimental intervention study reported here trained classroom teachers to be explicit when teaching low reading groups to use reading skills strategically. Twenty-two teachers participated in the study. It was hypothesized that explicit teacher explanation of how reading skills can be used as strategies would result in increased student awareness of what was taught, which in turn would lead to increased reading achievement on standardized measures. Results suggested that the treatment teachers learned to be more explicit in teaching reading skills, and that this explicitness resulted in significantly greater student awareness of what was taught. However, no significant achievement gains were found. Due to its methodological complexity, the study has implications for future research in naturalistic settings.

Constraints on Teacher Change

Duffy and Roehler examine teacher resistance to change by collecting self- report data on why a particular instruc tional innovation was not regularly implemented in classroorrs. Results in dicate that certain conditions constrain teacher thinking about innovations. These conditions are described. Hypo theses are presented regarding the ways these constraints modify teacher im plementation of instructional innova tions. Implications for teacher educators and researchers are suggested.

A Qualitative Study of Seatwork in First-Grade Classrooms

learning opportunities for everyone? Teachers have developed strategies for coping with the complexities of their job and for providing equitable treatment of all students. One common strategy, revealed in studies of time use in elementary schools, is creating time for working with small groups by having other students work independently. In many classrooms, students spend up to 70% of their instructional time doing independent seatwork assignments (Fisher et al., 1978). In this article, we present descriptive data from a study of how well this arrangement works for different achievement

Visioning and the development of outstanding teachers

Abstract This paper asks whether, in our enthusiasm for particular ideologies, methods or programs, literacy educators may unwittingly be encouraging teachers to become followers rather than independent users of professional knowledge. I argue that at a time when teachers must develop complex forms of literacy for an increasingly pluralistic clientele in the face of heightened public pressure to conform and comply, preservice teacher education must develop in teachers the psychological strength and spirit to make their own decisions rather than looking to us for answers. I offer a rationale for this hypothesis, provide an example of how literacy educators might develop teachers’ psychological strength, and ask whether we in teacher education are willing to teach teachers to be independent of us.

Why Strategy Instruction Is So Difficult and What We Need to Do About It

Reading strategy instruction has recently received much research attention. Typical of this research are laboratory studies such as those by Miller (1985, 1987) and classroom studies by Palincsar (Palincsar & Brown, 1984), Paris (Paris, Cross, & Lipson, 1984), Pearson (1985), and ourselves (Duffy, Roehler, Sivan, et al., 1987). This instructional research is based on what researchers have learned about how expert readers use strategies (Pressley & Brainard, 1985; Segal, Chipman, & Glaser, 1985). Strategies are defined as cognitive activities readers engage in as they construct meaning from text (Paris, Lipson, & Wixson, 1983). Unlike routine procedures associated with skills, strategies are flexible plans that readers adapt to the comprehension demands of the text.

How Teachers' Instructional Talk Influences Students' Understanding of Lesson Content

Preliminary research To understand this paper, one must know that it is part of a larger, 4-year program of research that examines the effects of explicit teacher explanations on (1) student reading achievement and (2) student reports of what was taught (Duffy, Roehler, & Wesselman, 1985). Following a pilot study, an experiment was conducted in 1982-83 that resulted in significant relationships between teacher explanations and student awareness of lesson content but no differences in student achievement on standardized tests (Duffy, Roehler, Meloth, et al., in press). The data used for this report were collected the following year as part of a descriptive study of seven experienced fifth-grade teachers who taught in seven urban elementary schools in a large school district in the Midwest. The primary purpose was to field-test researcherdesigned achievement measures that could supplement standardized tests in subsequent experimental studies. Each teacher volunteered to participate in training designed to improve basal reading textbook skill instruction and to be observed while

Conceptualizing instructional explanation

Abstract Explanation is described as a distinct form of instructional talk having four characteristics. These characteristics were derived from the qualitative analysis of the verbal interactions of four sets of effective and less effective second-, third-, and fifth-grade teachers studied in each of four different academic years as they taught reading skills and strategies to low-group students. The characteristic properties were identified by comparing the verbal explanation of the effective teachers with the instructional talk of less effective teachers. Excerpts of lesson transcripts are used to illustrate each of the characteristic properties, and implications are suggested for instructional psychology, teacher effectiveness research, and teacher education.

Editorial Comment: Guest Commentary: Teachers' Theoretical Orientations and the Real Classroom.

A four year‐study of teacher beliefs and conceptions about reading is reported. Teacher beliefs were determined outside the classroom context and while conducting instruction. It was determined that classroom teachers can articulate theories of reading outside the classroom but that their actual instructional practice is governed by a complex set of contextual factors. It is concluded that reading educators must not only teach reading theory but must also help teachers apply theory to the complex instructional context of classrooms.