Link:

https://ila.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/rrq.039
Reference Information:
Vaughn, Sharon, Swanson, Elizabeth A., Roberts, Greg, Wanzek, Jeanne, Stillman‐ Spisak,
Stephanie J., Solis,Michael, & Simmons, Deborah (2013). Improving Reading Comprehension and
Social Studies Knowledge in Middle School. Reading Research Quarterly, 48(1), 77–93. doi:
10.1002/rrq.039
Lit Review:
For this study, the lit review was nestled into the “Introduction” section. The researchers concluded
based on previous research that most social studies teachers struggle to teach both literacy and
content because most content-area texts in social studies are too far above their students’ reading
levels. Another study in that past had shown that because of that teachers tend to do all of the
reading on their own and they only give students the important points in the form of a PowerPoint
presentation, thereby skipping the literacy aspect.
Research Question/Purpose: The question at hand was how to improve reading comprehension, i.e.,
literacy, while also improving content knowledge in middle school social studies.
Research Design/Independent Variables: The manipulated variable in this study was the introduction
of the intervention, Promoting Acceleration of Comprehension and Content Through Text
(PACT).
Performance Measurement/Dependent Variables:The performance measurement is measured by
whether or not implementing readings into social studies classes will change students scores from a
pretest and posttest. The treatment groups were given readings related to the content in which they
were studying, and by doing this they were gaining more knowledge than the comparison group
which was not.
Research Results: For the ASK the comparison was .089 and the treatment was .514, a difference
of .425. What the researchers found was that there was a 30% increase in student performance
between the pretest and posttest. It also showed that the treatment group outperformed the
comparison group even though they had the same amount of time, instruction, and other factors.
After the experiment it has been proven that the treatment group outperformed the comparison
group on all three measures (content knowledge, content reading comprehension, and standardized
reading comprehension).
Implications:This experiment was designed to test if content readings would be beneficial to both the
students and teachers in their content area. After conducting this research it shows that, yes, adding
in content reading into a unit will help the students better understand the content and overall better
themselves in reading comprehension. Both the treatment and comparison classes were given the
same content knowledge, only that the treatment class was given content readings as well. With this
research it should be seen that implementing content readings should be a priority for any teacher to
help educate their students.
Questions and Concerns raised by this research: A question I still have is did the research take into
account the level of content readings they assigned these 8th grade social studies classes? What
was their students’ overall reading level at? This is important because if your students are not up to
a level that the reading requires then this research would be proven ineffective in my opinion
because the students would not understand what they are reading.