Reading Research Quarterly
Vol. 32, No. 2
Judith Rosenhouse
The Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel
Dina Feitelson
University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel
Bracha Kita
A.D. Gordon Teachers Training College, Haifa, Israel
Zahava Goldstein
University of Haifa, Israel
Interactive reading aloud to Israeli
first graders: Its contribution to literacy
development
R
ecent literacy research claims that children who
do not grow up in a literate environment in
which they develop their literacy skills have less
chance of success in reading acquisition and ex-
traction of meaning from texts than children who grow
up in different conditions (Mason, 1990; Morrow, 1989b;
Purves & Elley, 1994; Strickland & Taylor, 1989). Apply-
ing an ethnographers’ approach, literacy researchers ob-
served the homes of literate middle-class families to
study the ways in which parents help develop their chil-
dren’s literacy (Baghban, 1984; Heath, 1983; Teale,
1986). Reading to children was a daily activity in these
homes (Durkin, 1966; Taylor, 1983).
Such research identified important elements in the
interaction between parents and their children through
storybook reading, including (a) active roles for parents
and children in which the event is a negotiation, with the
parents asking, illustrating, and explaining and the child
reacting and responding, and vice versa (Cochran-Smith,
1986; Heath, 1982); (b) parents’ supporting the child, di-
recting and guiding him/her in the use of linguistic cues
168
April/May/June 1997
©1997 International Reading Association
(pp. 168–183)
(Cochran-Smith, 1986; Heath, 1982); and (c) parents’ me-
diating between the text and the child (Cochran-Smith,
1984, 1986; Teale & Sulzby, 1987), since stories typically
use high language registers (Martin, 1983).
Studies of the benefits of parents’ reading stories
to their children led to the transfer of this activity from
the home to formal educational institutions at the earliest
possible age (Morrow, 1989a; Strickland & Taylor, 1989).
Reading stories aloud as a part of the teachers’ instruc-
tional schedule was shown to contribute to the students’
reading growth. It affected their vocabulary acquisition,
widened their world knowledge, deepened their reading
comprehension, and changed their attitude toward
books and leisure reading (Elley, 1989; Graves, 1986;
Hoffman, Roser, & Battle, 1993). Students who enter
school with less exposure to the tools of literacy and
who are more at risk relative to their literacy acquisition
(Roser, Hoffman, & Farest, 1990) benefited most from
this reading activity, since one of the characteristics dis-
tinguishing them from middle-class students was little
exposure to books or generally different leisure reading
ABSTRACTS
Interactive reading aloud to Israeli first graders: Its contribution to literacy development
THREE ISSUES were examined in this study: (a) how reading to a
first-grade class of children requiring enhancement (who may be
identifiable as socially and culturally challenged) affects their
achievement in decoding, reading comprehension, and storytelling;
(b) how reading stories out of a series written by one author affects
their achievement as compared with reading isolated stories; and, (c)
how reading different types of literature affects the amount of vol-
untary reading. Fifteen Israeli first-grade classes (339 participants)
were randomly divided into four treatment groups, three experi-
mental groups and one control group. The first group (four classes)
listened to stories (published in school readers) by different authors.
The second group (four classes) listened to stories by one author.
The third group (three classes) listened in installments to a multi-
ple-volume series of stories written by the same author as the second
group. The control group (4 classes) engaged in regular activities
Lectura interactiva en voz alta a niños israelíes de primer grado: Sus contribuciones al desarrallo de
la alfabetización
EN ESTE estudio se examinaron tres cuestiones: (a) cómo la lectura
a niños de primer grado que requieren apoyo (social y culturalmente
en riesgo) afecta su desempeño en decodificación, comprensión lec-
tora y relato de historias, (b) cómo la lectura de historias tomadas de
una serie escrita por un autor afecta su desempeño en comparación
con la lectura de historias aisladas, y (c) cómo la lectura de difer-
entes tipos de literatura afecta la cantidad de lectura voluntaria.
Quince clases israelíes de primer grado (339 participantes) fueron
divididas al azar en cuatro grupos de tratamiento: tres grupos exper-
imentales y un grupo de control. El primer grupo (cuatro clases) es-
cuchó historias (de libros de lectura) de diferentes autores. El segun-
do grupo (cuatro clases) escuchó historias de un mismo autor. El
tercer grupo (tres clases) escuchó en etapas una colección de histo-
rias escritas por el mismo autor que el segundo grupo. El grupo de
Interaktives Vorlesen bei israelischen Erstklässlern: Beiträge zur Entwicklung der Literarisierung
DREI BEREICHE wurden in dieser Studie untersucht: (a) Wie das
Vorlesen bei Kindern auf der ersten Schulstufe deren Leistungen im
Dekodieren, in der Sinnerfassung von Texten und im Erzählen von
Geschichten beeinflußt—was eine qualitative Leistungssteigerung er-
forderlich macht und welche Kinder als sozial und kulturell Heraus-
geforderte anzusehen sind. (b) Wie das Vorlesen von Serienge-
schichten eines Autors die Leistungen der Schüler beeinflußt im
Vergleich mit dem Lesen von in sich abgeschlossenen Geschichten;
(c) Wie das Vorlesen von verschiedenen Textgattungen den Anteil
an selbständiger, freiwilliger Lektüre beeinflußt. 15 israelische erste
Klassen (339 TeilnehmerInnen) wurden nach dem Zufallsprinzip in
vier differenzierte Leistungsgruppen geteilt, und zwar in drei Unter-
suchungsgruppen und in eine Kontrollgruppe. Die erste Gruppe
(vier Klassen) bekam Geschichten verschiedener AutorInnen aus den
approbierten Lesebüchern vorgelesen; die zweite Gruppe (vier Klas-
sen) hörte Geschichten von einem Autor. Die dritte Gruppe (drei
Klassen) hörte Fortsetzungsgeschichten einer umfangreichen Serie
von Geschichten, geschrieben vom gleichen Autor wie die in der
169
(worksheets, drawing, pasting, etc.). The teachers of the three ex-
perimental groups were asked to read interactively to their students,
that is, to interact with their students before, during, and after read-
ing in order to help them to understand the story. They were to do
this during the last 20 minutes of the day, five times a week, for 6
months. The findings indicated that classroom story-reading to first-
grade students led them to increases in decoding, reading compre-
hension, and picture storytelling. Among the various types of treat-
ments, reading by teachers from a series of stories in installments
was shown to have the greatest effect on reading achievement on
the extent of reading for pleasure and on the quantity of books pur-
chased for leisure reading. The findings suggested that exposure to a
series of stories initiates a process (a magic secret), which stimu-
lates young readers to reread these books.
control (cuatro clases) realizó las actividades regulares (hojas de tra-
bajo, dibujos, etc.) A las maestras de los tres grupos experimentales
se les pidió que leyeran interactivamente a sus alumnos, es decir, que
interactuaran con sus alumnos antes, durante, y después de la lec-
tura para ayudarlos a comprender la historia. Debían hacer esto los
últimos 20 minutos del día, cinco veces por semana, durante seis
meses. Los hallazgos muestran que la lectura de historias en el aula
mejoró la decodificación, la comprensión lectora y el relato de histo-
rias a partir de un dibujo en los niños de primer grado. Entre los difer-
entes tipos de tratamiento, la lectura en etapas de una colección de
historias tuvo el mayor efecto en el desempeño en lectura y en la can-
tidad de lectura por placer y de libros comprados. Estos hallazgos
sugieren que la exposición a una serie de historias inicia un proceso
(un secreto mágico) que estimula a los niños a releer esos libros.
zweiten Gruppe. Die Kontrollgruppe (vier Klassen) beschäftigte sich
mit lehrplanmäßigen Aktivitäten (Arbeitsblätter, Zeichnungen,
Knetmasse, etc.). Die Lehrer der drei Untersuchungsgruppen waren
beauftragt, interaktiv mit ihren Schülern zu arbeiten, d.h. vor,
während und nach der Lektüre zu interagieren, als Hilfestellung zur
Sinnerfassung der Geschichten. Sie mußten dies jeden Tag in den
letzten 20 Minuten des Unterichts tun, fünfmal pro Woche, sechs Mo-
nate lang. Die Ergebnisse zeigten, daß das Vorlesen im Klassenzim-
mer bei Erstklässlern zu einer Leistungssteigerung beim Dekodieren,
bei der Texterfassung und bei der Erfassung von Bildgeschichten
führte. Unter Anwendung von verschiedenen methodischen Formen
zeigte es sich, daß das Vorlesen von Fortsetzungsgeschichten den
größten Einfluß auf die Leseleistung hatte, und zwar im Bereich des
unterhaltenden Lesens und in der Anzahl der Bücher, die als
Freizeitlektüre gekauft wurden. Die Ergebnisse legen den Schluß
nahe, daß die Begegnung mit einer Serie von Geschichten eine
Entwicklung (ein magisches Geheimnis) einleitete, die junge
LeserInnen dazu anregt, diese Bücher nochmals selbst zu lesen.
ABSTRACTS
La lecture à haute voix interactive avec des enfants israéliens de 1° année: sa contribution au
développement de la lecture-écriture
ON A examiné trois questions dans cette recherche: (a) comment la
lecture à une classe de première année d’enfants ayant besoin de
soutien (identifiable comme un défi social et culturel) affecte leur
réussite en décodage, compréhension de lecture, et lecture d’his-
toires; (b) comment la lecture à haute voix d’une collection écrite par
un auteur affecte leur réussite par rapport à la lecture d’histoires sé-
parées; et (c) comment la lecture de différents types d’écrits affecte
le volume de lecture personnelle. On a réparti au hasard quinze
classes de première année en quatre groupes de traitement, trois
groupes expérimentaux et un groupe contrôle. Le premier groupe
(quatre classes) a écouté des histoires d’auteurs différents (publiées
dans des manuels scolaires). Le second groupe (quatre classes) a
écouté des histoires d’un seul auteur. Le troisième groupe (trois
classes) a écouté des épisodes d’une collection d’histoires en
plusieurs volumes écrites par le même auteur comme le second
groupe. Le groupe contrôle (quatre classes) a effectué des activités
170
habituelles (fiches de travail, dessin, collage, etc.). On a demandé
aux enseignants de faire une lecture interactive à leurs élèves, c’est-
à-dire d’interagir avec eux avant, pendant et après la lecture de façon
à les aider à comprendre l’histoire. Ils devaient procéder ainsi
chaque jour pendant les 20 dernières minutes de classe, cinq fois par
semaine et pendant six mois. Les résultats indiquent que la lecture
d’histoires à des élèves de première année les conduit à des pro-
grès en décodage, compréhension de lecture, et lecture d’images.
Parmi les différents types de traitement, on a pu montrer que la lec-
ture par les enseignants d’une collection d’histoires par épisodes a eu
l’effet le plus massif sur la réussite en lecture, le volume de lectures
pour le plaisir et la quantité de livres achetés pour la lecture de loisir.
Les résultats suggèrent que l’exposition à une collection d’histoires
induit un processus (un secret magique), qui stimule la relecture de
ces livres par les jeunes lecteurs.
Interactive reading
habits (Feitelson, 1987; Feitelson & Goldstein, 1986;
Mason, 1990; Morrow, 1988; Roser et al., 1990).
It should be questioned, however, whether such
intervention is too late, and whether it is possible to
compensate such populations by intervention in the for-
mal educational framework. Studies on this issue have
pointed out the positive effect of reading programs for
at-risk students (Cohen, 1968; Mason, 1990; Morrow,
1987, 1988; Roser et al., 1990).
In Israel, this topic was studied for kindergarten
and elementary school populations in both individual
and small-group reading sessions. Other studies dealt
with reading in a whole-class setting with kindergarten
children and school children. In these studies the chil-
dren of the experimental groups scored better than their
peers in control groups in reading, reading comprehen-
sion, and picture storytelling (Feitelson, Goldstein, Iraqi,
& Share, 1993; Feitelson, Kita, & Goldstein, 1986).
A central issue examined as part of the application
of reading programs in educational frameworks is the
development of children’s attitude toward books and the
extent of their leisure reading (Elley, 1994; McKenna,
Kear, & Ellsworth, 1995). It has been suggested that
reading books should be placed in the classroom, prefer-
ably in open-shelf libraries with numerous attractive vol-
umes. Correct use of the library invites children to bor-
row books and read them at leisure and to share them
with their friends through reading aloud in class
(Morrow, 1989a; Strickland, 1989; Strickland & Morrow,
1990). Studies of such programs point to changes in chil-
dren’s attitudes toward reading and to their growing in-
terest in pleasure reading (Morrow, 1982; Morrow &
Weinstein, 1986). Similar results were found for children
at risk with little previous experience in literacy
(Morrow, 1987).
An experiment in Israel that examined the effect of
teachers systematically reading stories aloud in class also
revealed an increase in book borrowing from open-shelf
class libraries and interest in voluntary reading by chil-
dren in the experimental group (Feitelson & Offir, 1988).
This usually occurred after the teacher had read to the
class passages from books, especially series stories (i.e.,
stories written by the same author in which the hero is
accompanied by a few permanent secondary characters
who move on from one adventure to another).
A similar finding emerged from another study con-
ducted with a first-grade class (Feitelson et al., 1986)
where students requiring enhancement served as the ex-
perimental group. Besides the enthusiasm for listening to
series stories read aloud and an increase in leisure read-
ing by these children, the teacher reported an increase in
purchases of trade books (sold commercially) for volun-
tary reading. It was also found that these students
171
outscored the children in the control group (which in-
cluded two classes) on measures of decoding, reading
comprehension, and active use of language.
The advantage of reading series stories in groups
(Richek & McTague, 1988) or in the whole-class setting
(Feitelson et al., 1986; Feitelson & Offir, 1988) may be
defined as “hooking beginners on reading” (Feitelson,
1988, p. 166). This is of great importance since it affects
beginning readers and stimulates them to read books for
pleasure. Subsequently, it helps them to develop their
literacy.
Schema theory (although some researchers claim
that there is no single schema theory, but a family of
schema theories—cf. Whitney, Budd, Bramucci, & Crane,
1995) may shed light on the phenomenon of the attrac-
tion of young readers to series stories. According to this
theory, previous world knowledge affects the reader’s
comprehension. Another factor is previous knowledge of
story grammar (Dimino, Taylor, & Gersten, 1995;
Pearson & Fielding, 1991; Wilson & Anderson, 1986).
The question that follows this theoretical approach is
whether the familiarity element of series stories, for ex-
ample, topics and structures (Billman, 1984; Chall, 1983)
affects reading comprehension and hence affects the
amount of pleasure reading done by readers exposed to
this kind of text. In other words, will the familiarity ele-
ments (i.e., world knowledge and story grammar famil-
iarity) have an impact on hooking beginning readers on
reading?
The conditions of the Feitelson et al. (1986) study
on a first-grade class requiring enhancement did not al-
low generalization of the conclusions since it was based
on one experimental class in which the teacher was
asked to read aloud installments of series stories to her
students, and two control classes with no systematic
reading. Moreover, it could not be determined whether
the achievement of the experimental class was due to
exposure to reading in general or to exposure to reading
series stories in installments.
The present study tackled this issue again with
more subjects and more text manipulations related to the
earlier findings. Specifically, we examined three ques-
tions: (a) What is the effect of reading to first graders re-
quiring enhancement on their achievement in decoding,
reading comprehension, and storytelling? (b) What is the
effect on their achievement of reading from series stories
by one author as compared to reading isolated stories by
one author or by different authors? and (c) Is there a
correlation between the kind of literature read to the
class and the amount of voluntary reading that subse-
quently takes place?
172 READING RESEARCH QUARTERLY April/May/June 1997 32/2
Method
Participants
Sixteen first-grade classes requiring enhancement
(defined in Hebrew te’unei-tipuah) from eight elemen-
tary schools in Haifa and its suburbs participated in the
study. The nearest North American term for te’unei-
tipuah is possibly socially and culturally challenged.
However, due to unique social/historical circumstances
in the Middle East, the conventional Hebrew term
te’unei-tipuah is retained here. It literally means “requir-
ing enhancement.” This term was coined in the 1970s
following studies that diagnosed differences in students’
scholarly achievement on the basis of countries of origin
(Asia-Africa vs. Europe-America). The Ministry of
Education viewed such differences with concern because
major accepted values in Israeli society included equality
of social opportunities, social integration, and the merg-
ing of groups from different diasporas. Various enhance-
ment and compensatory strategies were necessary, and
the Ministry of Education sought specific means of iden-
tifying the population that required enhancement. The
definition of students as te’unei-tipuah was established
in 1974 (Algrable, 1974) on the basis of the analysis of
the 1972 annual all-country achievement test results (this
test assembles the results of 8 years of elementary
schooling). Schools that were defined as requiring en-
hancement were entitled to governmental help and fi-
nancial support according to the proportion of the stu-
dents requiring enhancement.
In all, 339 students, Israeli-born Hebrew speakers,
were sampled by a two-stage cluster sampling method.
Children who were new immigrants in these classes, and
thus not native speakers of Hebrew, were excluded from
the statistical calculations though they took part in all the
activities of the experiment to prevent feelings of alien-
ation among class members. Age range was 5 years, 8
months to 6 years, 11 months, with 6 years, 4 months
being the average age at the beginning of the experi-
ment. All the teachers who participated in the study had
the same professional background: They were graduates
of a teachers’ training college and had taught at least 5
years in elementary schools.
The total of 16 classes were randomly assigned to
four treatment groups as follows: Six randomly chosen
pairs of classes from six schools served as the experimen-
tal groups. These 12 classes were randomly divided into
three experimental groups of four classes each. The last
two pairs of classes from the last two schools formed a
fourth group, the control group. Both classes in the pair
from the same school were exposed to the same treat-
ment to avoid possible contamination by the study. A
month after the beginning of the treatment, it became ev-
ident that a teacher of a class in the third group was not
acting precisely according to the researchers’ require-
ments, namely, reading daily and systematically, and
therefore this class was excluded from the study. Hence,
the third group now consisted of three classes, while the
first, second, and the fourth groups had four classes.
Each group was exposed to a different treatment,
as follows. The first group, the multiple-author group,
listened to isolated stories written by different writers, se-
lected by the teachers from various readers used in ele-
mentary schools in Israel. The second group, the single-
author group, listened to isolated stories written by one
Israeli writer. The third group, the series group, used a
series of stories written by the same author whose single
stories were read to the second group. The fourth, the
control group, engaged in the regular learning activities
of first-grade classes—worksheets, drawing, and pasting.
In most Israeli first-grade classes, libraries are main-
tained and stories are often read aloud on Fridays at the
traditional weekly Sabbath Eve ceremony. However, dai-
ly systematic read-aloud sessions did not take place in
the classes selected for the study. Thus, the difference
between the groups in this respect was that the control
group children were not exposed to increased and con-
trolled read-aloud sessions in class.
Materials
Pretest
The Hebrew version of the Vocabulary Sub-test
taken from the Revised Wechsler Intelligence Child test
(Lieblich, 1979) served as a pretest. Since the Vocabulary
Sub-test results were connected by Nevo (1972) with
general learning achievement (presumably including
reading achievement) and it was used by other re-
searchers (cf. Feitelson et al., 1993) who applied the
same method, we employed it in the study as a control
covariate. This was intended to neutralize possible pre-
liminary inequalities among the groups.
The pretest was conducted individually outside the
classroom before the treatments began. Each child’s
score was expressed as a standard score based on the
raw score, which was the total, accumulated from the 23
words of the test, in accordance with the Vocabulary
Sub-test for children (Lieblich, 1979). Raw score range
was 0–39 and the standardized score range was 0–19.
Posttests
At the end of the treatment period subjects were
assessed using three tests: decoding, reading compre-
hension, and picture storytelling. All the tests were con-
ducted in the presence of at least two examiners. The
Interactive reading
reading comprehension test was given in the classroom
in the teacher’s presence. Reading and storytelling tests
were conducted consecutively during one individual ses-
sion per child outside the classroom.
Decoding test. A 46-word text taken from a Hebrew
reading diagnosis booklet was used for diagnosing de-
coding reading skill (Illan, n.d.). Some changes were
made in the text so that it contained most of the conso-
nants, vowels, and final letters (graphemes) of modern
Hebrew. (The validity of these changes had been exam-
ined and confirmed in a pilot study to be described lat-
er.) Each child was asked to read the text aloud while
the examiner marked the child’s errors without him or
her noticing it. The score was defined by the number of
correctly read words in the range 0–46.
Reading comprehension test. A multiple-choice test
with 16 items was selected from various versions of
reading comprehension tests in Hebrew (Ortar, 1976;
Ortar & Sar’el, 1986). We chose texts with questions re-
ferring only to the information provided in the text. The
order of the items was based on the results of the pilot
study. Different scores were allotted to the different
items, taking into account varying degrees of difficulty
(from 1 for easiest items, e.g., “Circle the bird [in the
above figures] that is not raising its head,” to 5 for the
most difficult, e.g., “‘When I was a boy in kindergarten
we all went out on Tree Day to plant a tree. Now after
30 years I went back and found a forest.’ Who wrote
this? A young fellow, a little boy, an old man, an adult.”).
Each child had to read silently the 16-item multiple-
choice test and mark with a circle the answer s/he con-
sidered to be correct (one of four options). The reading
comprehension test score (range 0–48) expressed the
number of correct answers.
Picture storytelling test. The task of telling a story
elicited by a sequence of pictures served in studies on
the development of the ability to tell a story (Berman,
1988) as well as in studies on the development of the
story concept, that is, story schema (Poulsen, Kintsch,
Kintsch, & Premack, 1979; Stein & Glenn, 1982). The test
consisted of four colored pictures depicting an eventful
story (Hechtkopff, 1970): (a) A boy is riding his bicycle;
(b) hearing an aeroplane, he looks up at the sky, fails to
notice a tree, and bumps into it; (c) another boy who
watches the scene comes to his aid and takes him home;
and (d) his mother puts a bandage over his wounded
knee. These pictures were used successfully elsewhere
(Feitelson et al., 1993; Feitelson et al., 1986) and were
therefore applied in this study. Each child was asked to
tell the story of the pictures to the examiner in an indi-
vidual session. The child’s speech was simultaneously
transcribed and tape-recorded. Later, story analyses were
based on the written protocols, and, in case of doubt,
173
the written version was corrected according to the
recordings.
To assess the children’s stories we chose six mea-
sures recognized in the literature as analyzing the devel-
opment of literacy, that is, the level of the concept of a
story (Bamberg, 1987). We decided to introduce only
those measures that could best reveal and distinguish ma-
jor literacy features acquired by the children during the
year of the experiment under the different treatments.
Since literacy begins to emerge in the first grade, we
chose to highlight the noteworthy features among our
first graders’ achievements. The measures dealt with (a)
story length, (b) story structure, and (c) story cohesion.
(a) Story length. Story length was defined by the
number of clauses per story. Unlike some researchers
who use the proposition (based on Fillmore, 1968) as
the basic linguistic unit for story analysis (Kintsch, 1977;
Poulsen et al., 1979; Roth & Spekman, 1986; Stein &
Glenn, 1979), we used the clause (Berman, 1988; Martin,
1983). According to Berman and Slobin (1994, p. 26) a
clause refers to “any unit containing a unified predica-
tion,” for example (in Hebrew) hine yeled (here’s a boy),
ve po hayeled al ofanayim (and here the boy is on a
bike), and ve hu nafal (and he has fallen down).
(b) Story structure. This was analyzed by the fol-
lowing measures: story grammar, beginnings, and codas.
Story grammar was analyzed on the basis of the story
grammar model. This model is a hierarchical system of
laws by which we can characterize the categories in the
story, describe the relations among the categories, fix
their place in the story, and determine the conditions
dictating their transfer or elision (Mandler, 1982;
Rumelhart, 1975; Stein & Glenn, 1979). Following
Whaley (1981) and Kozminsky (1986), we decided to
use Mandler and Johnson’s (1977) model.
To analyze the stories, an ideal story was defined
(which, according to Stein & Glenn, 1982, can also be de-
fined as a well-formed story) based on 25 adult stories.
The ideal story thus included 15 categories. A child’s sto-
ry was defined as ideal if it included all 15 categories.
Story beginnings and codas were examined accord-
ing to the children’s ability to introduce and end stories
effectively (Bamberg, 1987; Labov, 1972). The occur-
rence of a story beginning and coda, according to narra-
tive conventions, would be considered good (Galda,
1984; Garnett, 1986; Poulsen et al., 1979; Rumelhart,
1975). A 5-point assessment scale was designed.
Regarding beginnings, the scale ran from 1 point for the
poorest beginning related to the context, such as “I see a
boy here” (see Zahava’s story, Appendix A), to 5 points
for the best beginning according to narrative conven-
tions, such as “Once there was a boy who liked to ride a
bike” (see Danny’s story, Appendix A).
174 READING RESEARCH QUARTERLY April/May/June 1997 32/2
As to codas, the scale ran from 1 point for the
poorest coda, which suspended the narrative at a high
point without concluding the event, such as “and he
took him to the nurse” (see Allon’s story, Appendix A),
to 5 points for the best coda, which included a resolu-
tion of the problem introduced into the story, such as
“and the doctor bandaged his leg, and he went home
safely and told mother everything that happened to him”
(see Linoor’s story, Appendix A).
(c) Story cohesion. Story cohesion was examined to
test the children’s ability to tell coherent stories with suf-
ficient cohesion components by the following measures:
deictic expressions and reference system. Deictic expres-
sions of time and location were counted in each child’s
story. Following Karmiloff-Smith (1979), deictic expres-
sions were defined as the use of verbal expressions with
nonverbal expressions (i.e., pointing gestures) for loca-
tion (e.g., “I see a boy here”, see Zahava’s story,
Appendix A) or for time (e.g., “Now I see an aero-
plane”). The proportion of these expressions to the total
number of clauses was then calculated, yielding the ratio
between the amount of deictics and the total length of
the story. Note that high scores in this measure actually
mean low achievement because much use of deictics in-
dicates a child’s high dependence on the immediate con-
text of the pictures and lack of abstraction as well as
relatively poor vocabulary.
The reference system examines children’s ability to
present new (undefined) participants and later refer to
them as known (with the definite article) (Clark &
Haviland, 1977; Haviland & Clark, 1974; Martin, 1983);
for example, “Once there was a boy who liked to ride
bicycles. One day an aeroplane flew by and the boy
looked at it” (see Danny’s story, Appendix A). For scor-
ing purposes, all such references were first counted, and
a second count included only the correct occurrences of
references in the story. The ratio between these two
counts constituted the child’s score for this measure.
Allocation of books for the treatment groups
Two fundamental factors in the decision about
which books to acquire for the experiment were (a) the
books’ use of vowels and (b) their types of literature
(i.e., isolated stories written by various authors with dif-
ferent styles vs. series stories written by one author using
a uniform style). Hebrew orthography is basically conso-
nantal; that is, it lacks vowel letters (English a,e,i,o,u).
Instead, diacritical points and some other marks within,
above, and below the letters are used to indicate vowels.
These marks are used for teaching children to read and
are printed in readers for first to third grade. Books for
fourth grade on are printed without these diacritical
marks as are all other modern Hebrew texts (except po-
etry and the Bible). For our first graders, who had only
just learned how to read, only vowelled books could be
applied in the study.
Thus, the multiple-author group was given readers
intended for the second and third grades used in various
elementary schools. The books included stories and po-
ems by several writers and poets, representing different
styles and story schemas. The average length of the sto-
ries was three to five pages. Each class of the multiple-
author group received six readers for its open-shelf li-
brary, from which the teachers read the stories aloud.
For the single-author group we purchased a num-
ber of anthologies comprising short stories by the same
Israeli author who wrote the series acquired for the third
group. Following Radday (1969) and Radday et al. (1985),
we assumed that since the short stories were written by
the same author as the series stories, the language and
style would be similar. In Radday (1969) three linguistic
levels (phonology, morphology, and syntax) of the book
of Isaiah were examined to determine whether it was
written by one, two, or more authors. The underlying as-
sumption on which Radday based his study was that
one’s language takes shape as the outcome of one’s lin-
guistic experiences, which evolve in the course of life.
Hence, we can assume that the style of the stories given
to the single-author group and the series group were
similar and that differences between results may be at-
tributed to the different genres.
Surveys of Israeli children’s reading preferences
found the Kofiko series to be popular among fourth-,
fifth-, and sixth-grade Israeli students (Bergson & Levy,
1984a, 1984b). Based on this and the results of a previ-
ous study (Feitelson et al., 1986), six stories from this se-
ries were acquired for the series group. The hero of the
series is a naughty monkey, who is accompanied by a
few permanent secondary characters who experience
different adventures in typical Israeli environments in
each volume. The Curious George series is similar
(though intended for younger readers). We may com-
pare Kofiko also to The Baby-sitters Club, Goosebumps,
Henry and Mudge, or Noddy series. Out of the numer-
ous published versions of this popular series, we chose a
nonchildish format. Each book (22.5cm x 15cm) contains
chapters, is about 100 pages long, and includes tiny
black-and-white illustrations.
Thus, a different kind or genre of literature was
chosen for each of the three experimental groups with
the goal being to compare the different effects of these
listening sessions. As noted, the control group was given
no extra books for the class library. However, at our re-
quest the control group classes kept open-shelf libraries,
each with about 30–40 books, like the experimental
groups (for a full list of the books, see Kita, 1992).
Interactive reading
Procedure
Pilot study
A pilot study was conducted a year prior to the
main study to check the research design, materials, etc.
A school of students requiring enhancement in Haifa
agreed to participate in the pilot study, which lasted 4
months and included four classes: two parallel first-grade
and two parallel second-grade classes. The conclusions
drawn from this study were applied in planning and ex-
ecuting the main study as described earlier (e.g., focus-
ing on first graders only and adding stories by the same
author to compare with stories written by different
authors).
Teachers’ preparation
At the beginning of the school year, a meeting was
held with the principals and teachers at each of the eight
schools involved in the study to describe the study and
explain the researchers’ requirements. The teachers were
instructed to read each story only once, applying an in-
teractive reading model (Mason, Peterman, & Kerr,
1989). This model requires activities before, during, and
after the reading in order to help students to understand
the story. Thus, before reading, the teachers were asked
to show the book cover to the children, read the title
and ask the children to explain it, and clarify their ex-
pectations from the story. Then the teachers were re-
quested to read the story literally as written, but to insert
explanations of difficult lexical items, idioms, and pas-
sages during the reading. They were asked to activate
the children’s prior knowledge during the session and
foster the process of deepening their comprehension of
the story. They were requested to encourage the chil-
dren to ask questions, think about the content, and re-
late the story to their own experience. After the reading
the teachers were asked to summarize the gist of the sto-
ry with the children and repeat its main ideas. An exam-
ple of such activity, taken from Bracha Kita’s field notes,
is found in Appendix B.
Although each teacher approached the reading in
an individual manner—that is, used different intonation,
mimicry, etc.—they did their utmost to satisfy the re-
searchers’ instructions. The interactive reading activity
was monitored by accompanying observation studies.
Treatments
After the pretest, the allocated books were distrib-
uted to the class teachers, and the treatments began in
December. The experiment continued until June, nearly
to the end of the school year.
As mentioned, the teachers in the three experi-
mental groups read from the selected books for 20 min-
175
utes, 5 days a week, at the end of the school day. After
reading aloud, they placed the books on open shelves
so that children could read them during the school day
or borrow them for leisure reading at home.
These sessions proceeded with enormous enthusi-
asm, not the least on the part of the children themselves.
The sessions were temporarily suspended only before
holidays and because of formal ceremony preparations
or extracurricular activities such as a visit to the zoo. All
the classes retained their regular seating for the read-
aloud sessions except for one class who sat together on
the rug in the middle of the classroom. At the end of the
treatments, posttests were administered during the last
month of the school year.
Observations and interviews
The active read-aloud treatment was accompanied
by an observation study. One of the authors (Kita) sat in
the class as an observer once a month, on average, for
about half an hour each observation. The passive partici-
pant observation technique, generally used by ethnogra-
phers, was applied during these observations. The ob-
server, engaged in passive participation, “is present at the
scene of action but does not participate or interact with
other people to any great extent. About all you need to
do is find an ‘observation post’ from which to observe
and record what goes on” (Spradley, 1980, p. 59).
Accordingly, the observer in this study, whose presence
was evident to both teachers and children, watched the
scene and took notes without interfering in the work.
After class observation the observer held collective
talks with each class and individual interviews with
teachers and children. The interviews were intended to
assess the teachers’ impressions of the experiment and
to discuss problems as they arose. The interviews with
the children were meant to assess the amount of their
leisure reading and book acquisitions.
The children were asked about the leisure books
they had read, either school books or trade books.
Reference books such as dictionaries or atlases were not
counted. School books were defined as books in com-
mon use for teaching at school, such as readers, math
books, spelling books, and geography books. Trade
books were nonschool reading books, written for plea-
sure by various authors and published in Hebrew by dif-
ferent publishers (e.g., Pinocchio, The Ugly Duckling).
Immediately following this question, children were
asked about purchasing books for pleasure reading. In
this category only trade books were considered. Three
interviews were held with each child during the study,
the first about 2 months after it began. The observations,
the class discussions, and the individual interviews were
all systematically documented.
176 READING RESEARCH QUARTERLY April/May/June 1997 32/2

Table 1 Posttest scores by treatment groups

Criterion Groupa Unadjusted Adjusted Fc Effect Posthoc

variables mean (SD) meanb sized group
(range) differencese

Decoding A 41.60 (4.04) 41.51 .176 B C D

(0–46) B 39.15 (6.75) 39.05 F = 9.11 –.261 A * * ns
C 43.20 (2.89) 43.32 .497 B — * ns
D 40.43 (5.63) 40.52 C — — *
Reading A 31.00 (9.21) 30.66 .553 B C D
comprehension B 27.50 (9.13) 23.37 F = 8.98 .226 A * ns *
(0–48) C 30.85 (7.62) 31.32 .618 B — * ns
D 24.72 (10.08) 25.09 C — — *

Picture storytelling
Story length A 10.31 (3.80) 10.19 .706 B C D
(unlimited) B 8.92 (3.87) 8.78 F = 10.13 .230 A * ns *
C 10.89 (4.64) 11.06 1.000 B — * ns
D 7.97 (2.96) 8.10 C — — *
Story grammar A 7.23 (1.56) 7.17 .714 B C D
(0–15) B 6.67 (1.83) 6.59 F = 18.75 .383 A * * *
C 7.82 (1.98) 7.91 1.137 B — * *
D 5.85 (1.75) 5.92 C — — *
Story beginnings A 2.83 (1.37) 2.82 .275 B C D
(1–5) B 2.98 (1.34) 2.97 F = 5.87 .373 A n.s * *
C 3.34 (1.53) 3.35 .621 B — ns *
D 2.38 (1.53) 2.40 C — — *
Story codas A 3.07 (.54) 3.06 .773 B C D
(1–5) B 2.86 (.68) 2.85 F = 24.39 .534 A * ns *
C 3.20 (.50) 3.22 .955 B — * *
D 2.37 (.88) 2.38 C — — *
Deictic A 7.0 (17) 6.9 –.402 B C D
expressions B 8.0 (22) 7.9 F = 10.22 –.381 A ns ns *
percentage C 3.8 (11) 4.0 –.461 B — ns *
(0–100) D 26.5 (49) 26.6 C — — *
References A 74 (18) 74 .428 B C D
percentage B 79 (16) 78 F = 10.69 .619 A ns * *
(0–100) C 79 (15) 79 .666 B — ns *
D 64 (21) 65 C — — *
a Sample sizes were as follows: Experimental A (multiple-author group), n = 106;
Experimental B (single-author group), n = 76; Experimental C (series group), n = 67; Control D, n =90.
b Adjusted for pretest WISC–R vocabulary.
c All F ratios are statistically significant beyond the .001 level according to MANCOVA test.
d adj. M of experimental group – adj. M of control group
Effect size = _______________________________________________
SD of control group
e Tukey’s posthoc test (1949) for comparing the adjusted means of the treatment groups. * p < .05.

Results ed score range: minimum = 0; maximum = 19). As a re-

Pretest
A statistically significant difference was found, F =
4.60, p < .01, on the pre-test WISC-R vocabulary measure.
Means and standard deviations were as follows: multiple-
author group: M = 8.99, SD = 2.47; single-author group:
M = 9.03, SD = 2.56; series group: M = 7.98, SD = 2.09;
control group: M = 8.11, SD = 2.25 (standardized expect-
sult of this, posttest differences were tested with multi-
variate analysis of covariance (MANCOVA), using pretest
scores as the control covariate.
Posttests
Table 1 presents the experimental and control
group means both adjusted and unadjusted for pretest
differences. The findings indicate statistically significant
differences among the four treatment groups in decoding,
Interactive reading 177

Table 2 Mean numbers of books read and purchased by treatment groups based on three interviews per child

Criterion Groupa M (SD) Fb Effect Coefficient Posthoc

variables sizec of variationd group
differencesc

Reading A 6.19 (3.48) .175 56.21 B C D

trade B 6.40 (4.16) F = 36.76 .334 65.00 A ns * ns
books C 11.68 (5.30) 1.830 45.37 B — * ns
D 5.22 (3.53) 67.62 C — — *

Reading A 2.32 (1.98) –.045 85.34 B C D

school B 2.18 (1.74) F = 19.66 –.124 79.81 A ns * ns
books C .54 (.86) –1.051 159.25 B — * ns
D 2.40 (1.77) 73.75 C — — *

Purchasing A 2.39 (2.55) .458 106.69 B C D

trade B 1.72 (1.92) F = 11.55 .105 111.62 A ns * ns
books C 4.32 (5.67) 1.474 131.25 B — * ns
D 1.52 (1.90) 125.00 C — — *
a Sample sizes were as follows: Experimental A (multiple-author group), n = 106;
Experimental B (single-author group), n = 76; Experimental C (series group), n = 67; Control D (control group), n = 90.
b All F ratios are statistically significant beyond the .001 level according to analysis of variance.
c M of experimental group – M of control group
Effect size = _______________________________________________
SD of control group
d SD
CV = ___ 3 100
M
e Duncan’s multiple range test (1955).

reading comprehension, and picture storytelling. The
posthoc group differences in decoding show that the se-
ries group significantly outscored the other groups (see
Table 1). Thus it seems that the treatment applied to the
group had the strongest effect on accuracy in reading.
As to reading comprehension, the posthoc differ-
ences (see Table 1) indicate that among the three experi-
mental groups, both the multiple-author group and se-
ries group significantly outperformed counterparts in the
control group. Thus, it seems that these two types of ex-
posure to reading significantly affect comprehension.
Posthoc group differences in picture storytelling
show that control group scores were statistically signifi-
cantly the lowest in nearly all the measures (the high
scores of the control group in deictic expressions actual-
ly indicate low achievement). These story analysis mea-
sures, we believe, are valuable in displaying children’s
progress. They reflect an internalised awareness and
growth by the experimental groups of the story concept.
Book purchasing and leisure reading
Assessment of leisure reading and book purchasing
were based on the three interviews with the children, in
which children were asked about any leisure books they
had read, either school books or trade books. Each book
scored one point, and the total score represented the self-
reported number of books read by the child during the
experiment. Each child’s score was equivalent to the num-
ber of books bought for him/her. Group differences were
tested by multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA).
Table 2 shows the following results. First, in read-
ing trade books for pleasure, the group difference in
number of such books read was statistically significant, F
= 36.76, p = .0001 (see Table 2). This finding was attrib-
uted to the fact that the series group children read a sig-
nificantly larger number of books than did children in
any of the other groups. The series group’s achievement
was especially great when compared with that of the
control group (almost 2 standard deviations above the
standardised score of the control group, see Table 2).
Second, in voluntary reading of school books, the
difference among the groups was statistically significant,
F = 19.66, p = .0001 (see Table 2). The number of school
books read was significantly higher in children of the
multiple-author group, the single-author group, and the
control group than in the series group. There was more
than one standard deviation difference between the se-
ries group and the control group. These findings com-
plemented those given previously and reflect the differ-
ent reading preferences among the treatment groups.
While the series group preferred trade books including
series they heard in class, the other groups preferred the
178 READING RESEARCH QUARTERLY April/May/June 1997 32/2
familiar school books (especially the class readers), even
for leisure reading.
We noted too that though the amount of reading
by the series group had a high standard deviation, the
relative dispersion of this group in regard to the amount
of leisure reading of school books was rather small (see
Table 2). This meant that for this latter measure most of
the children of the series group were clustered around
the mean.
Finally, in purchasing trade books for leisure read-
ing, statistically significant differences existed among the
groups, F = 11.55, p = .0001 (see Table 2). Calculation of
the coefficient of variation (i.e., the ratio between the
standard deviation and the mean) showed that all the
groups were heterogeneous in this measure and their
standard deviations were higher than the mean. The se-
ries group revealed the highest rate of heterogeneity,
and its standard deviation was 131.25% from the mean.
Comparing the mean of book acquisition by each group
showed that on the average children of the series group
bought significantly more books than children from the
other groups (see Table 2). Altogether, during the period
of the experiment, children of the series group acquired
twice the number of reading books than children of the
other groups. The effect size showed a difference of
more than one standard deviation in favour of the series
group, as compared with the other groups. The lowest
average number of acquired books was found for the
control group (see Table 2).
Discussion
One of the aims of this study was to examine the
effects of systematic daily exposure to listening to stories
in the classroom on reading achievement of Israeli first-
grade students requiring enhancement. The skills tested
at the end of the experiment were decoding, reading
comprehension, and picture storytelling. Based on the
differences between the three experimental groups and
the control group, we can assume that such treatment af-
fects reading achievement. In addition to a pairwise
posthoc comparison of the treatment groups, we carried
out a comparison of the three combined experimental
groups versus the control group for all the eight mea-
sures used in this research. The combined experimental
group markedly outscored the control group in all the
measures. This important outcome means that exposure
to any kind of reading enhances literacy; moreover, it
means that such intervention in the development of chil-
dren requiring enhancement may not be too late even at
the age they enter school, and it is possible (at least part-
ly) to compensate these children in the formal educa-
tional framework. Furthermore, different treatments were
found to yield different effects in decoding. The statisti-
cally significant differences between the scores of the se-
ries group and the scores of the other groups suggest
that listening to series stories was the most effective
method among those tested here.
It is possible, however, that the series group scores
were high not only because of the reading sessions and
the specific material. It is plausible to assume that the
presence of an additional factor such as extensive leisure
reading caused this result.
Extensive voluntary reading has a unique signifi-
cance for decoding: “If we want children to learn to read
well, we must find a way to induce them to read lots”
(Adams, 1990, p. 5). It seems that children who listened
to series stories were motivated or induced to “read
lots.” This helped them to practice their reading and
move on from the first reading stage to the second.
According to Chall (1987), this stage involves the transfer
from “letter-sound correspondences to knowledge of the
alphabetic principle and skill in its use” and it “integrates
knowledge and skills acquired in stage 0 and 1, reliance
on context and meaning as well as on decoding (phon-
ics), for identifying new words and reading with greater
fluency” (p. 69). In our view, we instilled in the series
stories children the capacity and disposition to read
freely and fluently.
From the reading comprehension test results, we
may conclude that any methodological exposure to story
reading, as in our study, enriches children’s vocabulary.
Although we did not test vocabulary acquisition, it can
be assumed that listening to oral story reading promotes
vocabulary growth (Elley, 1989). This, in turn, affects the
reading comprehension achievement of the listeners
since “researchers concluded that vocabulary markedly
influences reading comprehension” (Graves, 1986,
p. 59). In addition, read-aloud sessions presumably affect
students’ knowledge of story structure—that is, of story
grammar. Although there was no direct instruction of
story grammar in our study, we assume that such expo-
sure promotes reading comprehension (Dimino, Taylor,
& Gersten, 1995).
Likewise, read-aloud sessions probably affect stu-
dents’ world knowledge—their knowledge schemata.
This world knowledge, in turn, positively affects chil-
dren’s reading comprehension. Interactive reading ex-
pressed by the teacher’s support before, during, and
after the read-aloud sessions (Mason et al., 1989) proved
conducive to the children’s progress. Our findings also
corroborate the model of reading aloud in classrooms
described by Hoffman et al. (1993). The mediation be-
tween the texts and the listeners in the read-aloud ses-
sion helped to bridge the gap between the colloquial
and literary registers that exists in Hebrew (Berman,
Interactive reading
1988; Berman & Neeman, 1994), as well as in many oth-
er languages, and contributed to improving the chil-
dren’s scores in this measure.
Comparing the three experimental groups’ achieve-
ment in reading comprehension with those of the con-
trol group shows that only the multiple-author group
and the series group children statistically significantly
outscored the control group. In general, we may con-
clude that exposure to reading by teachers in class, and
particularly exposure to special sorts of literature, affect
reading comprehension.
The picture storytelling results, examined in light of
measures accepted in the literature (Bamberg, 1987;
Galda, 1984; Garnett, 1986; Mandler, 1982; Rumelhart,
1975; Stein & Glenn, 1979), reveal progress in produc-
tion of stories by children in the experimental groups re-
garding such aspects as story length, story grammar, sto-
ry beginning, story coda, deictic expressions, and
reference expressions.
Story length shows that systematic exposure to sto-
ries affects the ability of listeners to produce longer sto-
ries. Research on children’s stories shows a steady rise in
story length with age (Berman, 1988; Hudson & Shapiro,
1991); in our opinion, the experimental groups greatly
improved in this aspect. This finding is to be considered
with caution, however, for on its own it cannot predict
story quality (Berman, 1988).
The story grammar results allow the conclusion
that exposure to stories affected the story structure pro-
duced by the listeners. Stories narrated by the experi-
mental groups included significantly more categories
outlined in our ideal story than those produced by the
control group. The control group perhaps had a less
elaborate concept of a story.
In general, the beginnings and codas of the experi-
mental groups’ stories were better than those of the con-
trol group. It should be noted that the story beginnings
by the experimental groups mainly referred to the time
of the event (e.g., “Once upon a time” or “One day a
boy got out on his bike”) rather than to its location. The
codas generally resolved the problem in the story (e.g.,
“Finally the doctor bandaged his leg”) . A few of them
included a moral (e.g., “He promised his mother to be
careful and watch the road when he rode his bike”). By
contrast, the control group’s beginnings revealed less fa-
miliarity with the conventional story setting, and their
stories remained in a sense unended, suspending the
narrative without a coda at a high point. Such story be-
ginnings and codas give us a notion of the development
of the story concept in children (Bamberg, 1987; Galda,
1984; Garnett, 1986; Rumelhart, 1975). It seems that both
exposure to and discussion of numerous stories in class
teach children story schemata and enable them to inter-
179
nalise the necessary elements of the story’s structure.
These elements are later used in children’s own story
productions.
The ability of a narrator to tell a coherent story de-
pends on, among other factors, the cohesive elements
used in the story. A narrator has to deliver the story so
that it may be comprehended without the immediate
context. Deictics and reference markers are elements of
immediate context that take part in a story (Berman,
1988; Berman & Slobin, 1994; Halliday & Hasan, 1976;
Karmiloff-Smith, 1979; Martin, 1983). Our experiment
shows that the control group was greatly deficient in
these respects compared with the experimental groups.
It was profuse mainly in the use of deictic expressions in
its stories—on average four times more than in the ex-
perimental groups. From a developmental point of view,
the control group’s stories resembled those typical of a
3-year-old native speaker of Hebrew, who anchors the
ongoing discourse in deictic picture description, for ex-
ample, “by the spatial term here” (Berman & Neeman,
1994, p. 137). On this account the control group’s stories
were less cohesive.
Turning to voluntary reading of trade books we
see that exposure to daily read-aloud sessions affected
this measure (it was statistically significant, however,
only in the series group). As for school books, it seems
that only the series group drew away from them.
Increased book purchasing, which was an unex-
pected finding in a previous study (Feitelson et al.,
1986), was repeated here in the experimental groups
(again, statistically significant only in the series group).
This result may be associated with the differential impor-
tance placed on reading and books by these children.
We reiterate the findings concerning the series
group—an increased amount of leisure reading as well
as purchasing of trade books for leisure reading. The
children of this group read about 12 books on average
during the study period while those of the other experi-
mental groups read about half that number, and the con-
trol group children read even less. On the other hand,
the series group children read more trade books and
fewer school books than the other children. Moreover,
the series group children reported their preference for
the series stories. Altogether, 246 books from this series
were counted for these children. By their self-report,
each of them read at least one book from the series. In
contrast, only eight children of the other three groups re-
ported having read books as difficult as, for example,
the Kofiko series. Furthermore, the children of the other
groups mostly remained at a fairly low level of reading
short stories found in readers and thin trade books in-
tended for the reading acquisition stage (about 10–20
pages each). At the same time the series group skipped
180 READING RESEARCH QUARTERLY April/May/June 1997 32/2
to reading at a higher level, namely, adventure books
(about 100 pages each) such as the Kofiko series, as-
sessed by a reading preference survey as suitable for
children of Grade 2 and above (Bergson & Levy, 1984a,
1984b).
In our opinion, extensive leisure reading by the se-
ries group developed partly as a result of availability of
purchased books at home. The children could read and
reread the books as they liked. Following studies of re-
peated reading (Fresch, 1995; Martinez & Roser, 1985;
Martinez & Teale, 1988; Morrow, 1988; Yaden, 1988), we
assume that rereading the books helps children gain
control of their reading strategies. It also enables the
readers to internalise the language patterns characteristic
of written language, thus producing deeper interpreta-
tion of the contents, better prediction of plot develop-
ment, and linking of the story with personal experience.
Later, they “become confident enough to attempt some-
thing new after they have read and reread a familiar
text” (Fresch, 1995, p. 222).
The achievement of the children of the series
group is conspicuous compared with those of the single-
author group, who listened to stories written by the
same author. That is, even with similar stylistic-linguistic
factors (phonemic, morphemic, syntactic, and lexical
components) (Radday, 1969; Radday et al., 1985), the re-
sults in terms of leisure reading were different.
The amount of leisure reading and the purchase of
books for voluntary reading found in the series group, as
described previously, seems to indicate a magic secret. It
starts with listening to series stories and later reading
them. Explanations of this magic secret encountered
elsewhere (e.g., Feitelson et al., 1986; Feitelson & Offir,
1988; Richek & McTague, 1988) suggest that this kind of
literature is just right for children at the first stage of
reading, that is, the decoding stage (Chall, 1983, 1987).
This genre is appropriate because (among other reasons)
at its base is a familiar element that facilitates the begin-
ning readers’ contention with reading: The topics, struc-
tures, and language patterns are familiar (Billman, 1984;
Chall, 1983; Fresch, 1995; Martinez & Teale, 1988).
In terms of schema theory, familiar schemata trans-
ferred from one volume to another equip readers with
world knowledge and story structure knowledge, which
are essential for reading comprehension (Pearson &
Fielding, 1991; Wilson & Anderson, 1986). As a result a
chain reaction starts: The more the beginning readers are
exposed to the series books, the more background infor-
mation they accumulate about the world of the series
and the story structures; the more background informa-
tion they get, the better they understand the series sto-
ries; the better they understand the series stories, the
more they enjoy them; the more they enjoy them, the
more they read additional volumes of the series. This is
the magic secret.
The findings of this research are limited to Israeli
first graders. More work is needed to further examine the
effect of interactive read-aloud stories (either isolated or
from series) on reading achievements and voluntary
reading gains. It would be worthwhile to conduct a study
of additional age groups. Furthermore, it is important to
keep in mind that as a classroom intervention, this study
provides some information on basic literacy acquisition
measures but little information on school success.
Although we have stressed the growth of leisure
reading as well as the purchase of books for voluntary
reading among children in the series group, we must
modify our conclusions with a degree of caution since
they were based on self-report measures. Moreover, in
our experiment we used only one Israeli series of sto-
ries. Hence, the effect of series in general on the mea-
sures mentioned above should be reexamined using oth-
er series (although Feitelson & Offir, 1988, indicate
similar results with more than one series). Furthermore,
the different readability and linguistic difficulty levels of
this series of stories were not compared to the other
books in the various treatments. Thus, the impact of text
type used in read-aloud sessions should be reexamined
and needs further control. Further work can be focused
on a causal linking of the potential of the read-aloud
sessions with enhancing reading skills and reading for
pleasure.
Some questions, for example, could not be an-
swered in this framework: Is exposure to reading aloud,
in general, and series stories read-aloud sessions, in par-
ticular, effective in the long term? Is it necessary to con-
tinue such intervention in upper grades to maintain read-
ing achievement? Would there be similar findings if the
intervention were applied to older children? Are the re-
sults of exposure to reading carried over to school suc-
cess, or are they limited to the reading skills examined in
the present study? Would we obtain similar results if the
intervention were applied in foreign language instruc-
tion, such as ESL (English as a Second Language)?
To answer these questions, further controlled stud-
ies are necessary. They should be undertaken experi-
mentally in order to advance our understanding of litera-
cy in general and to develop reading literacy among
populations requiring enhancement in particular.
To conclude, the study has examined a hitherto
uninvestigated issue—the distinction between effects of
three text types on beginning readers requiring enhance-
ment. We found (as in other studies) that, generally, ex-
posing beginning readers to read-aloud sessions in an
early stage of reading acquisition improves their reading
skills and enhances them to become leisure readers.
Interactive reading
Comparison of the three text types has yielded clear in-
dications of the advantage of reading series stories over
isolated stories on certain reading skills, and mainly on
voluntary reading. The findings allow us to recommend
the use of read-aloud series stories as a tool to motivate
voluntary reading, at least for first graders. Likewise,
there is a basis to assume that voluntary reading has a
unique impact on reading decoding, reading compre-
hension, and storytelling abilities.
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Received March 27, 1996
Final revision received May 23, 1996
Accepted May 28, 1996
Interactive reading
APPENDIX A
Stories produced by children from different groups
Control group
Allon (a boy). The boy sees an aeroplane. And
here he has fallen. And a boy is running. And he took
him to the nurse.
Zahava (a girl). I see a boy here and the bike
looking at the aeroplane. And a boy fell off the bike.
And a boy ran to help him. And a boy is crying. And the
second boy comes and takes him home.
Experimental groups
The series group
Danny (a boy). Once there was a boy who liked to
ride the bike. One day an aeroplane flew and the boy
looked at it and the bike went wherever it wanted be-
cause he did not look. And suddenly he bumped into a
tree and blood came down his leg and it hurt him. A
friend of his came and helped him and said to him
APPENDIX B
ÒThe Fisherman and the KingfisherÓ: An example of a teacherÕs work at class (from Bracha KitaÕs field notes)
It’s 11:30 a.m. Teacher D. tells the children, “Okay,
everybody collect your things, we’re going to read a sto-
ry. Everybody move on to the rug.” Noisily and with evi-
dent joy, urging each other to hurry up, the children as-
semble quickly in order to hear the whole story before
the bell rings. D. opens a book and declares, “Today
we’re going to read the story ‘The Fisherman and the
Kingfisher.’ Does anyone know what a kingfisher is?
Right, it’s a bird that eats fish. It takes up fish with its
beak. What is to take up? Right, catches, takes up is to
catch fish with the beak. [The Hebrew name for the bird
is a compound comprising the root of the verb take up
and the noun fish.] Now let’s listen to the story and we’ll
see how the kingfisher helped his friend the fisherman.”
D. begins to read the story, pausing occasionally to
explain a word. For example, when reading the sen-
tence, “the old man crouched and placed it in his large
warm palm,” she asked, “What is crouched? Bent,” and
continued reading. Whenever she felt that an expression
183
“Don’t cry, it will pass,” and he said to him, “But what
about the bike?” He said to him, “Never mind, soon I
shall come and fetch it.” And in the end the boy came
and took him to the doctor. And the doctor gave him a
blood test, and he got well.
The single-author group
Linoor (a girl). One fine day Ron went for a walk
with the bike. In the blue of the sky he saw an aero-
plane. He looked at the aeroplane and looked, and sud-
denly bumped into a tree. A boy ran quickly because he
saw him. It must have been a friend of his. He picked
him up and did a good deed. He helped him and
brought him to the doctor and the doctor bandaged his
leg and he went home safely and told mother everything
that had happened to him.
or idiom was not clear she would stop reading and ex-
plain in detail. For example, when she read the sentence
“The women of the village used to buy fish from the
fisherman or trade them for barter” she stopped and
asked “What is barter?” Getting no correct answer she
explained, “To barter is to exchange one item of mer-
chandise for another. When you go to buy something,
what do you give the seller? Right, you pay him money.
But in our story some of the village women did not pay
with money, but with what? Good, with potatoes or
eggs. Fine, let’s continue.”
At the end of the story D. asked the class, “So why
was the bird really called kingfisher?” Together with the
children she summarized the sequence of events: A
good fairy helped the kind-hearted fisherman by turning
the beak of the bird in the story into a beak to take fish
out of the water. Thus the kingfisher saved the sick fish-
erman from hunger, in return for the fisherman’s kind
treatment of the bird’s injury.