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A study by Rickford (2001) showed that culturally relevant literature does make a positive impact on the enjoyment of reading and comprehension of what is read for at risk students in the 6^th and 7^th grades. She worked with a group of poor readers who were able to come up with insightful thoughts on literature when they were provided with culturally relevant fiction along with high order questions.

Rickford (2001) theorized that when children saw representations of themselves in the literature they were reading, it motivated them more than other texts. She states “ethnic folk tales and contemporary narratives have the advantage of increasing cultural congruence and motivation for multicultural students, through their inclusion of themes, situations, perspectives, language, and illustrations with which they can relate” (Rickford, 2001, p. 383).

The study (Rickford, 2001) was conducted over a two year period, from 1994 to 1996, in a split grade six/seven class in a school that served from kindergarten through 8^th grade. There were 25 students included in the study, a majority of whom were African American. There were also Hispanic and Pacific Islander students, who included Tongans, Samoans, and Fijians. A majority of the students scored below the 50^th percentile on the state test, the California Test of Basic Skills. Almost one third of the class was around only the 10^th percentile. The school was located in a low income urban area in northern California, and was surrounded by the Silicon Valley and San Francisco Bay area.

Six stories were chosen as a focus for the study (Rickford, 2001), three African American folktales and three modern stories about African Americans. All stories featured African American characters and had at least one full page illustration that was well drawn and showed ethnic minorities. After students read each book, they answered 11 questions. Two were about their enjoyment of the text, three quizzed the child with multiple choice about the surface features of the text but did not go for deeper understanding. These were recall only, and did not ask the students to interpret. The last six questions were higher order questions that asked the students to apply their knowledge of their own lives, and interpret the story and characters.

The multiple choice questions were scored on a scale, there was a most right answer, a somewhat possible answer, a barely possible answer, and an impossible answer, which scored from three to zero, respectively (Rickford, 2001). Then senior students at the university were trained to use rubrics to score the higher order questions, which were in short answer format. The inter-rater reliability was between 100% and 75%, depending on the question. It was lowest (80 and 75) for the two questions that asked students to put themselves in the situation and to write a new ending. For questions that asked them to make a moral judgment, identify a favorite character, and write about character feelings, the inter-rater reliability factor ranged between 84 and 100%.

Children identified with the folktales deeper relationships, and were able to identify with the personal circumstances that caused difficulty in the lives of characters in a completely different context (Rickford, 2001). This went far beyond the surface structures children are most often asked to identify on multiple choice exams. They also identified strongly with characters in a modern setting, and most of the time empathized with the underdog or whoever was being mistreated in the story.

Students seemed to especially enjoy the dialogue of characters that used African American English (Rickford, 2001). Even students who were not African American enjoyed this, but it was noted that many of them also spoke with features of AAE, especially Pacific Islanders. The students felt this feature made the stories more believable. A student “commented ‘I like the dialect because it was my kind of talk. I enjoy reading dialect stories and also I think it help [sic] the story’ ” (Rickford, 2001, p. 371). The researcher notes the research from this field that shows teachers who accept the use of dialects and also teach the Standard English a child will need to know for life skills will reach children better than one who attempts to eradicate native dialects. This also applies to the students’ engagement when their ethnicities are represented in illustrations. One student commented about the illustrations “I like the way they… are made and everything. AND THERE ARE BLACK PEOPLE [student’s emphasis]” (Rickford, 2001, p. 372).

Students scored higher on the higher cognitive demand questions than the low order questions (Rickford, 2001). Even though they were allowed to use the books to refer to, students scored a mean of 60% on the recall, multiple choice questions, and were more successful with 79% and 75% means on the critical evaluation and creative reading questions, respectively. The researcher attributed these differences to the fact that students could not use their real life experiences to interpret the answers; it was more literal and had to be found exactly in the text, not interpreted. On the higher order questions students were able to “stake a claim, and provide a well reasoned warrant in support of it” (Rickford, 2001, p. 379). She believed the reason was because students could apply things that happened to them in their lives to their answers here.

Rickford (2001) concluded that not only were culturally relevant texts important to student’s engagement with the text, but also that comprehension questions not only be based on surface details, but underlying themes and student reactions are important to engaging students in thinking about reading.

A critique of this study would emphasize its lack of a comparison. Since all the stories used were culturally relevant we have no way to see if the students would not have gotten the same scores with mainstream, not culturally relevant literature. The methodology seemed to only confirm what the researcher already thought. If other types of literature had been added, then we would have some proof here. But without that, the findings of this study lack credibility.

Trousdale and Everett (1994) also conducted a study to see how minority students reacted to literature.  They wanted to see if students from minority cultures comprehended the messages in mainstream literature, or if there was a cultural barrier that impeded meaning.

The researchers (Trousdale & Everett, 1994) included one elementary school teacher who taught at a school with a majority of African American students and who also wrote children’s books. The second researcher was a teacher from a local university. Both were Caucasian and spoke Standard English.

Their subjects (Trousdale & Everett, 1994) included 3 seven year old African American girls, none of whom were in the researcher’s classes. All students lived in a mostly African American community in a low income housing area. All children spoke the African American English dialect.   Two children came from single parent homes, one of whom lived with extended family (grandmother), and one of the children lived with both parents. Although many people in the area are unemployed, often because they were illiterate, the subjects chosen were all from families who were employed. All three children said they went to the library often, and that they liked reading. The first child admired her teacher, and wanted to be a teacher when she grew up. Another wanted to be a writer, especially plays, which she wrote and performed with children in the neighborhood. The last child was shy, but enjoyed reading as well.

Author number one wrote three different stories, all around the same theme of birthdays (Trousdale & Everett, 1994). It was decided to have her write them so it would be easier to analyze whether the students comprehended the author’s message, since the author was right there and not a third person! All books were humorous, and had main characters around the children’s age. One was “Mom Don’t You Like It?”, a story that included a lot of repetition, and two more stories, one based on Alexander and the Terrible, horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, and was called “The Worst Birthday in the History of the World”, where many bad things happen, but which of course has a happy ending. The last was based on The Day Jimmy’s Boa Ate the Wash, and was called “The Iguana Got Loose at the Birthday Party”, where a series of funny events follows one after the other. There was no information given as to whether illustrations accompanied the stories.

Each student was read each story separately in the living room of one of the researchers (Trousdale & Everett, 1994). The stories were read one week apart, and afterwards the child was asked to retell the story and asked questions about it. For the most part, students understood the plot very well. Only one child grasped the overlying message, which the authors speculate might show she is closer to the formal operations stage than other students her age. Most grasped a message such as the importance of obeying your parents, whereas the theme the author intended was “situations and people are not always what they appear to be. Through patient waiting, reasons for actions become evident” ( Trousdale & Everett, 1994, p. 6). The authors concluded that it was unreasonable to expect all children in first grade to comprehend abstract messages.

All the children identified with the main character, but only one of the children was on his “side”, thought he or she was the most important character and was right when there were conflicts with adults (Trousdale & Everett, 1994). Although the other two children identified with the main character, they thought the adults were the most important characters, and cited many flaws in the child such as selfishness, bad, or naughty. They justified the parents’ actions, even though they thought maybe they too were a lot like the child character.

When students were asked to retell the story, deletions or additions were almost all based on their life experience, and not from misunderstanding the story (Trousdale & Everett, 1994). For example, one student was not familiar with what Crackerjacks were, but was familiar with the Cracker Barrel store. Instead of saying the children got prizes from a Crackerjack box in the story, she said they went to the Cracker Barrel store and got prizes out of the machines there when she retold it. Not only did she replace Crackerjack with Cracker Barrel, but she also changed the surrounding details so it would make sense. In another instance, students added characters to the story to make them match their own family circumstances, for example saying one of the characters had two bothersome sisters (like herself), or saying a cousin and uncle had come to the birthday party (the student had close extended family relationships, especially with her cousin and uncle). This shows that students are always going to interpret a story with their own experiences.

Subjects also analyzed the stories based on their own cultural lenses (Trousdale & Everett, 1994). The student who wanted to become a teacher evaluated each books usefulness for that purpose, and the student who wanted to write plays discussed each book in terms of how it could be used in that sense.

These children used their lives and goals as a reference for their understanding and enjoyment of the texts (Trousdale & Everett, 1994). The conclusion of the authors is that it may be important to include literature that includes an emphasis on extended family when working with children of the African American community. Also it seems important to encourage students to use their own life experience to understand and interpret stories, as this may bring about a better understanding of the writing.

In critiquing this study, the reader must focus on its credibility and transferability. How the children were selected was not shared, and the children that were chosen did not represent a cross section of the community they lived in, rather in a location with high illiteracy and unemployment, children were chosen whose families were employed and who encouraged literacy activities. The findings then could not be transferred to the rest of the community. It is not a good representation of the students she would be working with, and so I would need justification as to why this sample was chosen. If they were not students of the researcher, how did she find them? If she found them, say, at the library, then this would not be a bias free sample. Perhaps the goal here was to create a sample where culture would be the only factor, and not reading ability, but then that needs to be stated. And since the problem in the community was the illiteracy, working with the comprehension of students who do not have the family support may be more important to research than how to help the students who already do have the family support.

Mohr (2003) investigated the different choices Hispanic and non-Hispanic children made in selecting a book to keep to identify if multicultural literature was preferred by non-white students. Since it has been shown that reading motivation is tied to the student’s ability to choose their own books, this type of inquiry is important to show teachers what type of books they need to have available for their students in the multicultural classroom. For all students to succeed in reading, they need to be motivated and want to read. This type of study shows us how we can provide texts that will encourage that to happen.  To wit, the study states “if teachers expose students to a variety of books and can direct students to books that interest them, students will spend more time reading independently” (Mohr, 2003, p. 163).

There is an assumption that students most likely would respond to books that have characters of their own race, since girls mainly like to read books about other girls, and boys about boys (Mohr, 2003). But not a lot of research has been put into this field, and this study (along with others to follow) seeks to discover the literature preferences of minority student groups. Mohr was looking to find the preference of first grade Hispanic students, gender differences between and within Hispanic and non Hispanic groups, and what genres they would select.

Books were used to represent both genders, a variety of genre including fantastic and realistic fiction, biography, informational nonfiction, and poetry, as well as Caucasian, Asian, African American, and Hispanic characters, the English and Spanish languages, and themes of family, school, nature, history, and fantasy (Mohr, 2003). The total number of books was nine. The book selection criteria and final choices were approved by a children’s literature expert, a bookstore owner, and librarian. All were recently published with interesting illustrations.

The subjects (Mohr, 2003) were from a semi rural district in the Southeast. Ten first grade classrooms participated, totaling 190 students. Thirty percent were Hispanic, their number was 56. Half of these students (28 total) were limited in their English language abilities. Instructions for these students were provided in Spanish if needed. In the whole group and the Spanish group, 55 % were boys and 45% girls.

The study (Mohr, 2003) was conducted at the end of the school year so the students had nearly two full years of school experiences behind them to become familiar with books. No information was provided about their background experiences with literacy, and the types of books or literacy choices they had in their classrooms, an important omission by the researcher.

The researcher (Mohr, 2003) set up a table outside the classroom to show the books and have students select one. The students were able to choose a book that was then ordered and sent to them, so it was an authentic choice they were making. Students came out one at a time to pick a book, and if they agreed to (65% did), the students were interviewed on their choice. The questions asked were “Why did you pick this book to keep? Why is this one (book) your favorite one in this group (of books)?” (Mohr, 2003, p. 168). The interview questions were done while the next child was picking out their book.

Two of the classrooms were chosen to have all the books read to them (Mohr, 2003). 41 of the students (no information on their race makeup was given) had three stories read to them by the researcher for three mornings in a row. These children then selected a book in the same manner as the rest of the classes.

Results (Mohr, 2003) show that almost all of the children (84%) chose non fiction. The favorite was Animals Nobody Loves, by Seymour Simon, and was chosen by 46% of the children in the study. Two more nonfiction books, a poetry book There’s a Zoo in Room 22, by Judy Sierra, and a comedic nonfiction book What Moms Can’t Do, by Douglas Wood, were chosen by 34% of the students together. Less than 10 students chose the rest of the books, which included a biography of Abraham Lincoln and five multicultural fiction stories. The students who were read to chose non fiction to an even greater extent, 90% of this group chose nonfiction. This shows that Animals Nobody Loves was not chosen only for the interesting title, but for the content since students who had read all the books still chose it.

There were more boys that chose nonfiction than girls, but the majority of girls still chose nonfiction (Mohr, 2003). Ninety six percent of boys chose nonfiction, and 69% of the girls. It was near the same for the Hispanic group, where 97% of the boys chose nonfiction and 76% of Hispanic girls chose it, while only 62% of non-Hispanic girls did. This shows the possibility that Hispanic girls may be more likely to enjoy nonfiction than non-Hispanic girls. The order of preference for girls and boys both listed the three aforementioned nonfiction books as their favorites, but in opposite order. Boys enjoyed Animals Nobody Loves most, then What Moms Can’t Do, and finally There’s a Zoo in Room 22. Girls chose There’s a Zoo in Room 22 first, What Moms Can’t Do next, and Animals Nobody Loves third.

During interviews, students most often cited humor and the fact that they liked animals as the reason for their choice (Mohr, 2003). Although there has been an emphasis in the early grades on fiction, this study showed that non fiction is where major interest lies for a majority of young children. Many stated that they wanted to learn something from the book, and one stated that “you get to see the information… and you need this information” (Mohr, 2003, p. 172).

No Hispanic boys chose books with Hispanic characters, and only 3 Hispanic girls chose these books (Mohr, 2003). This seems to disprove the theory that students prefer to read about characters like themselves. Almost all the children chose animal books and not books with human characters at all. Perhaps if a study were conducted where there was not the choice of animal books, it might more clearly investigate this question.

An important critique of this study is the fact that these nine books may not be enough to cover all the different attributes that were selected. There might be too many descriptors to have clear lines between what students chose if one book was chosen to represent so many of the characteristics. I think though, for the children to choose there might have needed to be a more limited selection so it did not get too confusing or drawn out. I think if this was the case the researchers needed to limit the attributes they were analyzing in the books to much fewer than 18 different descriptors. Also, in the results the researchers reports that for one of the books that was chosen by the students as a favorite, “the combination of elements makes it difficult to determine why students preferred this book” (Mohr, 2003, p. 174). A reader may ask, why was a book chosen that did not have clear characteristics that could be analyzed? This only further emphasizes either the need for more books or less criteria.

The research (Mohr, 2003) here seems credible, but again I would like to see better defined books being used. Perhaps provide nonfiction books about Hispanic figures or issues related to that culture. Another way to make strides toward credibility could be limiting the selection to only fiction or only non fiction. The scope of the questions asked was too broad for the amount of books used. The fact that nearly half the students chose the same book makes it clear that students do enjoy non fiction, but it is unclear as to whether they preferred the book about animals or because it was in fact non fiction. The only fiction books used were about humans, possibly having animals as a main character in a fiction tale would have changed the results. Also, the only nonfiction with human characters was a biography of Abraham Lincoln, who did not represent the Hispanic culture. It is an interesting idea, but needs to be expanded upon with future research.

The Effect of Teachers Attitudes and Expectations on Students Learning Love and Kruger (2005) conducted two studies on the cultural relevance of assimilationist views in working with African American students. The first study investigated the correlation of professional educator’s attitudes to their own demographic identifiers.

Professional educators in six different schools were selected for the sample (Love & Kruger, 2005). Five of the schools were located in the same southeastern city, and another lay in a different southeastern city. Four of the schools in the first city were participating in a program in partnership with a major university to evaluate their own instructional strategies. The fifth school from that city was in a program to infuse the arts into the curriculum. The sixth school that was located in another city was chosen because it had a long term commitment to outstanding inner-city education. All the schools had some level of low income students, and four of them had 95 % of students who received free and reduced lunch.

Two hundred and forty four teachers, para educators, specialists, and administrators from the six schools were chosen to participate in the study (Love & Kruger, 2005). The range of experience was from zero to thirty seven years. The participants consisted of 48% African American, 42% Caucasian, 3% Hispanic, Indian, Asian, or Biracial, and 7% of the respondents chose not to answer the question. The median age of the teachers was 38, but they ranged in age from 22 to 64. The mean level of experience was 12 years. Eighty five percent of the educators surveyed were women.

The participants read 48 statements and rated them from strongly disagree (0), to strongly agree (4) (Love & Kruger, 2005). The statements are arranged in six categories, knowledge, race and culture, social relations, the profession of teaching, teaching methods, and students’ individual needs and strengths. Twenty five of the statements aligned culturally relevant beliefs, the rest reflected assimilationist views. Culturally relevant views included a belief in students’ abilities, emphasis on cooperative learning, and the importance of the impact of race on a student’s experience. Assimilationist views do not take individual or cultural differences into account in teaching methods or goals.

The knowledge portion of the survey showed that teachers mostly strongly agreed with two culturally relevant and one assimilationist statement (Love & Kruger, 2005).

Teachers agreed that reciprocal teaching and critical thinking were essential, but they also strongly agreed (77.9% agreed or strongly agreed) that a teachers job is to “disseminate knowledge to [his or her] students” (Love & Kruger, 2005, p. 90). Teachers disagreed on a statement about expectations of children’s prior knowledge, with teachers of younger students expecting students to come to school with less knowledge of what was to be taught than the teachers of older students were.

Teachers agreed that a student’s ethnicity and or culture are important factors in their learning, but they also agreed with two assimilationist statements that promoted colorblindness, that is they agreed that when they saw a child, they saw just that, a child, and not that child’s race (Love & Kruger, 2005).

Teachers were split, some agreed and some disagreed, about the strength of their relationships with their students (Love & Kruger, 2005). Teachers that had attended historically black colleges and universities seemed to be more positive about their relationships with students.  I wonder if the researchers considered that teachers who went to historically black colleges and universities may indeed be black themselves, and so this could be part of the reason they identified with African American students more strongly. It did not provide a racial profile of the teachers who answered this question, an omission on the part of the researchers.  They provided racial demographic information of the teachers when they discussed their participants, but neglected to use that information when discussing their results.

For 3/4 of the statements about the cooperative responsibility for each child’s achievement, teachers did not come to any kind of consensus, with large numbers both agreeing and disagreeing (Love & Kruger, 2005). When it came to parental involvement, teachers were split mostly on the grounds of the schools they were teaching in. All schools agreed with “parents ought to be self motivated to help their child learn and be actively involved in the classroom” ( Love & Kruger, 2005, p.91). Schools that had strong parent involvement disagreed with the statement “I hardly ever see or hear form the parents of the children in my classroom” ( p.91). Two of the other schools had teachers who disagreed with each other about these statements. The schools were located in a lower income neighborhood than the first two, and saw less of the parents because many were working more than one job. The schools were also instituting programs to increase parental involvement, so these factors could explain the disagreement among teachers. The last two schools agreed with the statement. They seemed to see less of the families, because though they were low income like the second set of schools, their residents were more transient and they did not have the programs to increase parent involvement.

Teachers agreed with four culturally relevant statements about the profession of teaching (Love & Kruger, 2005). These statements showed that the teachers saw the relevance of working in urban schools, and their desire to do so. Most teachers disagreed with each other on an assimilationist statement stating that inner city children needed a good education so they could leave the inner city for a better life.

In considering statements about teaching methods, teachers agreed with culturally relevant statements that allowed students to share their own knowledge with the teacher and showed the flexibility of letting a lesson go where it needed to go, and not confining it to a concrete plan (Love & Kruger, 2005). Teachers did disagree on two of the five assimilationist statements, which endorsed repetition and drill, and acknowledged the inevitability that some students will fail no matter what the teacher does.

Teachers endorsed culturally relevant statements about a student’s individual strengths and needs, agreeing that all students’ needs should be incorporated into lesson planning and that all students have some skill and can find success.  They rejected the idea that all “children basically learn in the same way” (Love & Kruger, 2005, p.92). The researchers concluded that though teachers recognized the importance of race and ethnicity to a students identity and life, the so called color blind statements seemed “more socially acceptable, or that to ignore racial and other differences in the classroom may seem more equitable” (Love & Kruger, p.95). The researchers stated that not recognizing the difference diminishes the importance of this factor in children’s lives. The study does not present research to support this conclusion, but cites other authors who have stressed the importance.

The second study by Love and Kruger (2005) looked at the correlation of the teachers responses to the test scores of their students. Two of the schools from the original study were used to pull teachers as subjects for this study. Both schools were working to effect change and become more culturally responsive. Both were very low income, and most of the students were African American. Fifty teachers were chosen. Their responses from the first study were used, and these were compared with test scores of their students on the Iowa Test of Basic Skills, (ITBS). The grades taught by the teachers ranged from kindergarten through fifth grade. Seventy percent were African American, 28% were Caucasian, and two percent were Indian (Native American or native or descendent of India was not indicated). The age of the teachers produced a median of 36 and 38, and again the range was quite broad, from teachers as young as 22 to as old as 55. The least experienced teacher had taught only one year previously, while at least one had been teaching as long as 30 years. The median for experience was nine years.

The test scores of 1,432 students were analyzed (Love & Kruger, 2005). The scores of each classroom were grouped together and averaged so each classroom had one score to analyze. Test scores were converted to Z scores so there would be compatible numbers for the correlation.

The study (Love & Kruger, 2005) showed that nine of the statements on the survey had significant correlations with the test scores of the students. Agreement with the statement “It is my job to disseminate knowledge to my students” ( Love & Kruger, 2005, p.90) was shown to correlate positively with students higher test scores in Language Arts (+.37) and reading(+.30). That this assimilationist statement correlated positively with achievement was surprising. Culturally relevant statements regarding the importance of success for a whole class, not just the individual student also showed a positive correlation (+.35) when it came to higher reading scores. These three questions had had a lot of disagreement, and teachers who agreed with them had students with higher test scores than those who did not agree. Teachers who saw teaching as a way to give back to the community also had students with higher test scores (+.41). The assimilationist statement “with enough repetition, drill, and practice, students will attain a passing grade” was also shown to have a positive effect on reading achievement (+.36).

The statements that showed teachers believed they could not reach all students and that they rarely had parents visiting their room were both negatively correlated with students test scores, (-.31 and -.41 in reading, respectively) (Love & Kruger, 2005). The less a teacher agreed with these statements, the lower the students’ test scores were. The researchers suggest that making a classroom as welcoming to parents as possible could be a way to reverse this pattern. Indeed, some situations may keep parents away for other reasons, but they suggest being as gracious and flexible with parents as possible may create an environment they feel comfortable entering.

The study (Love & Kruger, 2005) showed no correlation between race, culture, or ethnicity and students test scores, either high or low. The endorsement of the assimilationist statements that reflect traditional teaching methods were hypothesized by the researchers to connect to an experienced teacher’s use of flexible teaching strategies, as well as other culturally relevant practices.

In critiquing Love and Kruger’s (2005) study, the reader find things the researchers themselves recognize. The fact that the schools were going through organized efforts to become more culturally relevant may have caused some reporting problems. Teachers who know what they think the right answer is may not report their actual hidden beliefs, and may not even be conscious of them themselves. Some of the questions are obviously easily labeled as socially acceptable or not. The survey was not long enough to have differently worded statements that may catch some of these hidden assimilationist beliefs. An observation of a few of these classrooms as an extension could elucidate whether or not these policies are actually being used in the classrooms.

Another critique could be the fact that standardized tests are sometimes not the best way to see student’s real success (Love & Kruger, 2005). Other measures of achievement could be used to cross check these results as well. The researchers recommend further research into the connections between teacher attitudes and student achievement.

In summary, Love and Kruger showed that when teachers believed they could not reach all students, or reported that they rarely had parents visit the room, students reading scores suffered. When teachers viewed teaching as a way to give back to the community, students grades improved, just as they did when teachers believed that repetition would help students achieve passing grades.

Wilson-Jones (2003) investigated African American males’ attitudes and feelings on finding success in school. The study summarized that the research in this area has shown that often African American students, especially males, withdraw from engagement in their education because of wanting to reject mainstream culture. Also, “negative stereotypes associated with race cause students of color to under achieve academically and to disassociate with academics, because of fear of predicted failure” (Wilson-Jones, 2003, p. 2). Research has also shown that conversely, African American students with high levels of parent involvement, not necessarily parent education, performed better in school.

Subjects for the study came from a rural school where one fourth of the students are African American. One troubling statistic given was that half of the students who attended this school did not graduate from high school. Most of the families were low income, and there were high unemployment rates for families in the area. 16 African American males in the school qualified for and agreed to participate in the study. They ranged from grades three to six, and in age from eight to 13 years old. Seven of the students included in the study had repeated a grade level.

Students were interviewed six times, one on one with a researcher. Each time the interviews lasted half an hour. The interviews were tape recorded and analyzed later for common patterns. Their scores on the Mississippi Curriculum Test Scores and current grades were compared to their answers to find correlations.

It was found that students felt strongly about the influence their families had on their reading success. Students mentioned adults reading to them as small children, and expressed that they felt these events prepared them for learning to read and success in school. Students also felt it was important to have family to help with homework, to check it for correctness and also to help them understand what it was about. The students reported feeling more confident and competent in class on a day after they had received such help at home. Students also felt that having their parents come to school and be involved in their education in that way helped them to be successful. One student reported “It makes me feel proud, like I know someone is here to help me and explain it [school work]. It makes me feel funny inside. I am proud and excited that they are here” (Wilson-Jones, 2003, p. 11).

Subjects also seemed ready and willing to talk when there was someone (the researcher) willing to listen to their problems. Some students expressed concern about the threat of violence at home or school, while one felt safer at school because it was a smoke free, quieter environment where he could concentrate. Students also spoke of difficulties staying focused when teachers talked, and not understanding the directions on assignments causing them problems in school. Students reported they thought they could do better in school if they studied harder and listened more. Also, they reported that they thought that students who do well listen more to the teachers.

In looking at the connections between the students reported attitudes surrounding literacy and their test scores and classroom grades, it was found that students who said they had been read to before learning to read themselves had higher grades. Also receiving higher grades were students who received help from their parents on homework. Conversely, students who did not get help from their families did not do as well on the test or in class. Even students whose parents came to school when they were falling behind or in trouble did better than students whose parents did not involve themselves in their child’s schooling at all. Of the 9 children who had not repeated a grade, their parents more often were involved in their education than students who did repeat a grade.

The researchers recommend promoting pre-literacy activities in the community, designing programs for the schools that promote parental involvement, organizing programs for students to talk about their problems with peers, teaching study skills to students and parents, and programs that encourage reading

In critiquing this study, I would say that it would be interesting to see how much the scores correlated with the attitudes of the children. Since this information is not given, it is hard to know how much to trust the conclusion. When there is evidence in the article that a reader can see, it is much more believable, and can be confirmed by others who are analyzing the information. The fact that it is left out makes one wonder how strong it really was. We can see that the findings did agree with studies conducted in the past, so it is dependable in that way, but a reader can’t scrutinize information that is not presented.

Durkin (1984) studied African Americans with low SES who were good readers to find what factors contributed to their success. The 23 subjects included in the study were chosen by their performance on the fifth grade standardized test. They were spread across 13 different schools. Twelve of the subjects were female, and 11 were male. The students that scored half a year above grade level were included in the study. The students also all qualified for free lunch. They lived in a large Midwestern city.

The methodology of the study (Durkin, 1984) included finding what classes these successful students had been in, and then interviewing the teachers. Unfortunately it turned out that most of the students had transferred from other schools, and had transferred so many times that there were no patterns of teachers that provided more success than others. Only three of the subjects were students in the same school the entire time. Students transferred schools an average of nearly three times each.

Family structures of the participants included 7 students who lived with two parents, either biological or step parents (Durkin, 1984). Sixteen families had one parent, and only one of those was a single father. Of these 16 families, 9 of them also had grandparents living with them.

According to Durkin (1984), after students were identified, interviewers talked with the principals and asked them about the students in question, what factors might have contributed to their success, and what the school did to help that specific student succeed. Most principals knew little of the students in question unless they or a sibling had been in trouble. Even the three students who attended the same school from kindergarten through fifth grade were mostly unknown to the principal. They also were unable to articulate what the school had done to help with reading, chalking the success up to the student being bright.

Since no patterns were found for teachers more successful students had in common, the researcher (Durkin, 1984) was unable to interview the past teachers. She did interview the subject’s sixth grade teachers to see if they could shed some light.

Teachers knew little about the students’ families. They tended to suggest that these students in specific achieved more because they were intelligent, liked to read, and worked hard.  This information was not coming from the teachers who had actually taught the students to read, though, so it seems to not cover the aspect of the study the researchers had hoped for. Perhaps selecting a few of the highest readers in the study and going to their teachers as a case study might have shed more light, and actually gotten some results to analyze. The researcher had no way to get the information that he or she was searching for since patterns in the teachers the students had were not found. This causes major credibility issues.

The top 15 students were interviewed about reading, and were told that they were being interviewed so “their answers might provide information about how to help other students who did not read as well as they did” (Durkin, 1984). Almost all students said they had their own books at home and checked out books from the library often. Also, the students enjoyed reading. Parent expectations played a role for 14 of the 15 students in that their parents expected them to go to college.

Parents of these top 15 students were also interviewed (Durkin, 1984). The parents reported in 12 of the 15 cases that the students could read before they started kindergarten. Parents also said they read with their children often, and from an early age. Also, several had older siblings or cousins who played school with them and modeled and taught reading to them before they started school.

The finding that so many of the students had been reading before they came to school surprised the researcher (Durkin, 1984), and early childhood programs for reading were a recommendation of the research.  Durkin also noted the possibility that the students early achievement caused teachers to view them as students who were going to succeed, and so their expectations for these students were higher. This could have become a self fulfilling prophecy and helped these students to achieve while students the teachers did not expect to do well would not. The article concludes that information from all interviewed suggested that students love of reading and frequent reading is what caused them to be a good reader.

The critique of this study (Durkin, 1984) is the failure to collect the data it set out to find, that is classroom techniques that promote the success of readers. There could have been modifications made to the study to find this data, but this did not happen. I do not think that the results are credible or convincing. Durkin reported what the teachers, students, parents and principals said, but did not correlate this with the grades of the students or give proof that this was valid information, other than the fact that most interviewees said the same thing. This does add some dependability to the information, but there is still not enough proof that “reading often” and “working hard” caused the students to be successful in reading.

In summary, Wilson-Jones (2003) found that students attributed their success in school to the influences of their family, both in reading with them and in getting help with their homework. Durkin (1984) found that students who were successful in reading reported an enjoyment of reading and visited the library often.  Charity, et al (2004) found that students were successful at comprehension even when they couldn’t reproduce the story in School English, but rather used African American English.

Murray, Stahl, and Ivey (1993) explored whether using alphabet books had an impact on the phonological awareness of a group of students in a high minority, low income pre-k classroom. Phonological awareness is defined as the ability to understand that there are different sounds in spoken words, and the ability to manipulate these sounds.

The researchers (Murray et al., 1993) cite a conclusion from an earlier study conducted by two of their members which links a child’s knowledge of the alphabet with their phonological awareness. In that study, children who could recognize a majority of letter forms also had basic understanding of phonological awareness, and could identify onset and rime. This study (Murray et al., 1993) searched to find if using alphabet books could help students with familiarity of the alphabet and increase their phonological awareness.

Forty two children participated, and most were four years old, with only a few had turned five years old (Murray et al., 1993). Most of the students (86%) were African American, and all the students were low income. Genders were split with the majority of boys (63%) and only 37% girls. The preschools were located in a small city in the Southeastern region of the United States. The children came from three separate classrooms that were located in three different public elementary schools. Two students who were already reading were dropped from the study, as they already had phonological awareness covered. Another two were dropped because they refused to respond to tasks.

Children were pre-tested using Concepts About Print, in which students knowledge of print conventions are discovered through an assessor reading the story to the child and asking them questions. Next, an alphabet recognition exam was given where children attempted to identify capital and lowercase letters. The last assessment was the Test of Onset-Rime Awareness (Murray et al., 1993).

All three classes were focused on exploration at centers, but took time each day to share a story, read by the teacher (Murray et al., 1993). Each class randomly received a different type of books to read with their classes. One group had regular picture books, one had traditional alphabet books, and the other had alphabet only books. Each group was provided with four different books in their assigned genre, and the teachers or their aides were asked to read one of the books each day for three weeks. Most classes spent about ten minutes a day with the book. No instructions were given to the teachers as to how the books should be read.

The control condition (Murray et al., 1993) read regular picture books, which included Have You Seen my Cat? by Eric Carle, The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Seuss, The Gunniwolf by W. Harper, and Caps for Sale by E. Slobodkina. The traditional alphabet book group read books with the letters of the alphabet and words that started with these sounds provided. Their choices include From Apple to Zipper by Nora Cohen, Dr.

Seuss’s ABC by, of course, Dr. Seuss, Alphabears: an ABC Book by K. Hauge , and The Z was Zapped by Chris Van Allsburg. Alphabet only books consisted of books which had the letters of the alphabet, but did not have words with the sounds the letters made, only the letters themselves. Their books included The Gunnywolf by A Delaney, The Cat in the Hat Comes Back! by Dr. Seuss, Chicka Chicka Boom Boom by Bill Martin and J. Archambault, and an adaptation of The Z was Zapped dubbed The Z was Struck by Lightning in which children provided their own captions.

One of the researchers (Murray et al., 1993) observed in each classroom once a week. Field notes were taken during the readings. All classrooms had the children sitting on the floor around the teacher’s chair. In all classes, the students listened and participated.

The study (Murray et al., 1993) found that most of the children scored very low in both the pre and post test in of Concepts About Print, students overall had an only 0.91 point gain, a score of 3.64 to 4.55 in all groups. The group that gained the most was the storybook group, which gained 1.4 points. While alphabet gained .93 and alphabet only lagged behind at a .31 gain. An ANOVA showed significant gains in Concepts About Print across the treatment groups of f= 6.14 (p<05).

Letter recognition showed an improvement in all groups (Murray et al., 1993), with a score of f=5.98 (p<.5). All groups learned approximately the same number of new letters, which is surprising since one of the groups had books that did not emphasize the letters of the alphabet, but could be due to factors outside the scope of the study.

Phonological awareness improved in some of the study groups as well, with an f value of 14.2 (p<.1) (Murray et al., 1993). The group/time interaction was significant for this measure, with an f of 3.78 (p<05). This showed the subjects differed in the improvement of their phonological awareness between groups. The alphabet only group made no improvement between their pre and post tests. The conventional alphabet book gained 1.86 points, and the storybook group gained 1.27 points. The researchers conclude that that these similarities may be due to the fact that the teacher in the traditional alphabet condition did not emphasize the sounds of the letters, rather she read these books like any other book and emphasized the meaning of words, not the fact that the word started with a certain phoneme, for example the m sound in mouse. The teacher in the regular story book class was a former student of one of the authors, and knew the importance of phonological awareness. The improvements of her class might not even have been a result of the storybooks, but other activities held in the class.

The fact that one of the teachers was a former student of one of the researchers (Murray et al., 1993) could pose some objectivity problems. The personal relationship between researcher and, in some way, the subject, could be a problem. The teacher was not being tested here, but the teachers were not given instruction on how to read the books or conduct their class, and it seems the researcher had a major impact here. Also, information on the relationships or lack thereof between researchers and the other teachers was not given.

Variables in teaching style, as in the normal storybook classroom, could also have caused the changes attributed to the story reading by the researchers (Murray et al., 1993), causing some issues in reliability. Because there were three different teachers, the reader can’t know what to attribute the changes to, the variable the researchers put in place or the multitude of other variables that existed between the three classrooms. The study could be repeated, with possibly very different results if different teachers were used. If there was a chance to conduct this research in classrooms that had the same curriculum, or even a morning and afternoon session with the same teacher, it might be more valid.

Reyhner (1986) studied the representation, in number of appearances and in the accuracy and realism of those appearances, of Native American students in basal readers, the reading textbooks used with young readers. A review of the literature showed that Native American students are more engaged and comprehend more when the reading materials represented their culture accurately. It was important that the representations of Native Americans include not only historical representations, but also depict Native Americans as a living culture in modern times.

The material for this study (Reyhner, 1986) was taken from textbooks and basal readers implemented statewide in states over 5 million residents. Textbooks for first, third, and fifth graders were analyzed. There were 8 books chosen to analyze, the 4 most used, and of the 15 series that qualified, the 4 least used. This decision is not explained or justified. They did not differentiate the differences in Native American representation form the most used and least used books among the 15 that qualified. Random samples of 25% of the stories in each of the 8 books were analyzed for six categories of realism identified as important by experts in the field. These included a broad range of ages, conflict between characters, aggression involving children, the presence of basic life situations, negative emotions, and intellectual activities.

Of the 203 stories analyzed, only 16 had Native American characters (Reyhner, 1986). Only one story was found in the first grade books, six in the third grade books, and the rest (nine stories) were found in fifth grade texts. Most of them were found to represent modern Indian culture. There was not a broad range of tribes represented, most represented southwestern tribes. No coastal tribes (Atlantic or Pacific) were represented, and the Plains Indians only had representation in one story. Most stories were fairly realistic.

Most of the stories had rural settings, instead of urban settings (only 2 stories) (Reyhner, 1986). It was found that some of the stories had stereotypical aspects. For example, in one story about the production of pottery, the purpose for making the bowls was to sell them to the tourists instead of making them to maintain tradition. This depicts Native American’s in a way that makes their traditions about catering to white culture instead of showing the spiritual or traditional importance for these people in making their art. In another story, the illustrations depict terrain (mountains and rivers) that were not accurate to the lands that Hopi Indians lived in. Another story, about ballerina Maria Tall Chief, left out any aspects of her culture or heritage other than her name.

When the study analyzed the other stories as well, it was found that there were seven times as many white characters and twice as many African American characters as Native American characters (Reyhner, 1986). This may make sense when you compare the population of White, Black, and Native American students. But the fact is that if students comprehend more when they are reading about characters that are like themselves, then white students will have a much higher proportion of the literature that is easy to comprehend than minority students will. The authors suggested that it is important to supplement the basal readers with trade books that represent Native American student’s culture, especially tribe specific books if possible.

To summarize, Fry and Johnson (1973) and Stage, et al. (2001) both found that socioeconomic status may be a higher risk factor than race for many Native American students. Reyhner (1986) found a real lack of authentic Native American characters in texts, and recommended teachers use a variety of trade books that represent Native American culture, especially tribe specific works.

Effective Methods for Teaching African American Students  Charity, Scarborough, and Griffin, (2004) explored whether familiarity with

School English, or a Standard English Dialect, affected reading achievement in the early grades. The study was conducted with 252 students spread across three different cities, Cleveland, Ohio, New Orleans, Louisiana, and Washington D.C. All students were African American and between kindergarten and 2^nd grade. There was a roughly even gender split. This sample was taken from schools that were both low performing and low income. In New Orleans and Cleveland, one hundred percent of the students qualified for free and reduced lunch and in Washington D.C. ninety four percent qualified. Students were selected in a random sample from grades K, 1, and 2 in each of the schools.

The study (Charity et al., 2004) evaluated the participants in one on one sessions lasting fifteen to thirty minutes in April, May, or June in the 2000-2001 school year.

They were tested for reading achievement using the Woodcock Reading Mastery Tests- Revised. These tests assessed word identification, the phonological decoding pseudo- words, and comprehension. Students were then assessed on their ability to imitate School English. To determine this ability, students were asked to repeat sentences in a story in the same way the tester pronounced them. The story was designed to have elements that were pronounced differently in African American English and School English. The study was looking for a relationship between the students’ two test scores, and whether their familiarity or unfamiliarity with School English affected word identification, phonologically decoding pseudo-words, and comprehension. The examiners also asked comprehension and recall questions about the story the children had repeated. They were scored for grammar, phonological items, and memory in the story they had read.

The study (Charity et al., 2004) found that more imitations of School English occurred in the grammatical category (m=61.6, SD=22.6) than with phonological examples (m=50.8, SD=19.9). Results showed that children in New Orleans had less familiarity with School English than children in other cities. They hypothesized that in the South most people exhibit some language characteristics outside of Standard English, that have more in common with African American English. For example, the dialect may differ phonologically from Standard English, in terms of the reduction of the final consonant cluster from a consonant blend to only one of the consonants being pronounced, and a final s being deleted from plural words.

Kindergarten and 1^st grade students’ test scores on phonological and grammatical imitation were correlated with the reading test scores on word identification, phonologically decoding pseudo-words, and comprehension (rs=.42 to .59) (Charity et al., 2004). In second grade, this correlation was not significant for phonological tests (rs=.08 to .29), but familiarity with School English was correlated to grammatical imitation (rs=.34 to .49). The results showed there was not a strong correlation between the familiarity with school English and story recall for any of the three grades (Charity et al., p. 1348).

According to this study (Charity et al., 2004), students’ familiarity with School English will affect the way they use grammar or phonetically decode and pronounce words, but that no matter how they pronounce words, and no matter their familiarity with School English, they will still comprehend what happened in the story, and be able to retell it.

Fry and Johnson (1973) explored the relationship between oral reading fluency and reading achievement in a group of Native American subjects. Subjects for the study included 69 students. Forty five attended public schools and 24 attended a Bureau of Indian Affairs school in a nearby city. Both Schools were in Arizona. Students were Native Americans from the Pima Maricopa tribe.

The students were assessed using the Lorge- Thorndike Intelligence Test and the Metropolitan Achievement Test (Fry & Johnson, 1973). Students were separated into above average and below average groups based on these scores. Students were then asked to respond to 20 pictures to get a language proficiency sample. The amount of and difficulty of words produced by the students in response to these stimuli were recorded and analyzed to provide a score. Students who produced at least 30 Communication Units were included in the study, leaving 52 subjects. Then to control for sex, 10 more students were eliminated from analysis, leaving 42 students, 21 males and 21 females.

All students were in second grade.

For males, there was not a relationship between IQ and oral language scores, but there was a connection with female Native American students (Fry & Johnson, 1973).

It was also shown that males often needed fewer pictures to score at least 30 communication units. The above average group used more complex sentences. Below average students used more simple structures more often. This was also true for conjoining verbs.

The study (Fry & Johnson, 1973) showed that the above and below average readers did not differ very much in reading achievement, above average scoring a median of 2.1 on the exams and below average readers just three tenths of a point less, at 1.8 median for the group. It also showed that there were more above average students in the public school than the tribal school, but acknowledged that could be due to the difference in socioeconomic status rather than the schools, since attendees of the BIA school did have lower income in general than those attending the public school. A factor not considered in this analysis is the possibility that traditional Native American people may be less verbal than in mainstream culture. This is not a rule, but a trend that has been observed. Students taught by teachers who expect them to be more verbal will indeed produce more communication units than students in a tribal school, where verbal communication is not as highly stressed. The test given also may have not been a setting students at a tribal school would be verbal about; where as other activities might elicit more dialogue from them. It would depend on how their schooling is structured, but classroom practices are not covered by the study.

The study is hard to generalize to Native American students in other settings, due to the small study size, and the inclusion of only one tribal group, when there are over 200 Native American tribes in the country.

Stage, Sheppard, Davidson, and Browning (2001) studied students’ oral reading fluency. Since many students are referred to special education because of difficulties with reading, these researchers found it important to study early predictors of reading difficulty in students, so interventions can be implemented. Since knowledge of the alphabet has been shown to be a predictor of future achievement in reading, researchers used this to study its predictive value for a culturally diverse sample.

This study included 59 subjects (Stage et al., 2001). Seventy percent were Native American, 18% Hispanic, and 12% Caucasian. Students were followed throughout their kindergarten year. Most students were low income, 70% received free or reduced lunch. They attended a rural school in Washington State. There was an almost even gender split, with 47% of the students as male and 53% as female.

The study (Stage et al., 2001) focused on students’ familiarity with the alphabetic principle, that is, knowledge of letter names and phoneme grapheme relationships. The study investigated the connection of this knowledge in kindergarten to the development of oral reading fluency in the first grade. The researchers used Hierarchical linear modeling to create growth curves for different factors influence on oral reading fluency.

Students were asked to identify upper and lowercase letters that were randomly ordered (interrater reliability was 99%), and also using the same sheets, were asked to identify the sounds each letter made (interrater reliability was 98%) (Stage et al., 2001). They were also tested using curriculum based measurements of oral reading fluency.

These measures were taken in October, January, March, and May.

Kindergarteners received the normal curriculum used in the district, which included “print awareness, letter name knowledge, and letter sound knowledge.

Specifically, each letter name and its corresponding sound were taught in sequence….instruction was delivered in small groups of 4 students/ session” (Stage, et al., 2001, p. 229). In first grade, students learned phonological awareness and phonics rules.

It was shown that all students improved in oral reading fluency over the year (Stage et al., 2001). Kindergarten sound fluency and letter naming fluency predicted this growth. For sound fluency, t=2.98 (p<.01) and letter naming fluency t= 2.32(p<.05).

Letter naming fluency most strongly predicted first grade oral reading fluency. No differences were found on the basis of race in oral reading fluency.

The study concludes that letter naming may be an even stronger predictor of at risk students than letter sound identification (Stage et al., 2001). Students who can name letters already have a start on the letter sounds, since they are apparent in letter names for most letters. Also, familiarity with the alphabet may indicate pre-reading experiences with preschool or with family, who has taken the time to expose the child to literacy and teach them the alphabet. The study also concludes that race had little to do with performance, though socioeconomic status did, and may be a stronger risk factor overall. The researchers conclude that low SES students with difficulty in letter naming should receive early intervention to strengthen letter naming fluency in order to ensure they do not fall behind peers in first grade and beyond.

‘A dangling modifier is a phrase (or clause) out of place, as a weed is a plant out of place, making a mess of the garden.’

This is one of the most commonly encountered errors in editing: the dangling modifier. As Treddinick suggests, it truly does make a mess of writing. This article explores the dangling participle — a dangling modifier that begins with a participle — and discusses strategies for avoiding it in your writing.

Here are some problematic dangling modifiers to get us started:

• Tony drove home with his vegetables, following a police car.
• Laying eggs, Lucy chased the hen out of the coup.
• Enjoying views from the balcony, the birds sang a sweet morning song to me.

We will come back to these later in the article. To begin, let us remind ourselves about participles and learn about participle phrases.

What is a Participle Phrase?

We know from our earlier article, ‘Understanding Verb Forms — Part Three’, that present participles end in ‘ing’. They are verbs that describe a continuous action (‘dreaming’, ‘eating’, ‘walking’, ‘frying’, ‘typing’ etc.)

A participle phrase is a group of words — containing a participle — that modifies a sentence’s subject. In the earlier examples, the participle phrases have been italicized. Here are some more:

• After massaging her temples, Sarah felt relief from her headache.
• Washing the dishes, Albert felt a sense of satisfaction.
• Lying on the deck, the children gazed at the stars.

Each of these italicized participle phrases modifies the subject that comes directly after it (i.e. Sarah, Albert and the children, respectively). The participle phrases describe what these subjects are doing.

The Dangling Participle

When a participle phrase ‘dangles’ it means that the modifier is out of place or too far away from its subject. As a result, meaning is obscured.

Mark Treddinick confesses to his own dangling modifier, ‘I saw an eastern quoll last night, looking out my kitchen window’. Does he mean the eastern quoll was in his kitchen, looking out the window? Alternatively, does he mean that he was looking out the window, and saw an eastern quoll?

He probably means the latter, but the modifier, ‘looking out the window’, and dangles too far from the subject (‘I’) he intends it to modify. Instead, it has attached itself to the closest noun in the sentence (‘the eastern quoll’), leading to confusion.

Let us reconsider the problematic examples we gave at the beginning of the article. See how each of these participle phrases dangles too far away from the subject it intends to modify, with amusing results:

• Tony drove home with his vegetables, following a police car.
• Laying eggs, Lucy chased the hen out of the coup.
• Enjoying views from the balcony, the birds sang a sweet morning song to me.

Who is following the police car, Tony or his vegetables? Is Lucy laying eggs, or was she chasing a hen who was laying eggs? Are the birds enjoying a view from the balcony, or is the speaker?

Correcting Dangling Participles

These examples can be corrected by bringing the participle phrase closer to the subject they are intended to modify — Tony, the hen, and me, respectively. For some of these sentences, it’s a matter of reversing the order, for others it’s a matter of containing the participle phrase within commas as an aside:

• Following a police car, Tony drove home with his vegetables.
• Lucy chased the hen, who was laying eggs, out of the coup.
• While enjoying views from the balcony, I listened to the birds’ sweet morning song.

We hope this article has introduced dangling modifiers. Remember, a dangling modifier attaches itself to the wrong noun in a sentence and creates confusion. To check these, make sure your modifying participle phrases are right beside the noun you intend it to modify.

In a case study by Ruan (2003), three kindergarten age bilingual Chinese girls were studied to determine what the literacy experiences of these children were, and how the literacy instruction for these Chinese children in specific related to the teacher’s cultural beliefs. All the parents in these cases had jobs that required higher education.

Two of the girls were born in America and one was an immigrant. The study took place in a Midwestern town in a class where most of the students were white, and was taught by a white teacher.

The researcher (Ruan, 2003) acted as an observer and as an aide who spoke to the three girls in Chinese. She wanted to observe how the teacher interacted with different children, and especially notice how she treated the three Chinese girls. She found that the Chinese girls did not participate in whole group interactions unless they had to, for example, as in a situation where each person was expected to contribute something. The researcher attributed this to the fact that in the Chinese culture, children are discouraged from sharing information with adults.

In this classroom, the teacher only helped students who asked for it. Students who remained quiet and did not make their needs known were not given help, even if they needed it. In one instance, the Chinese immigrant did not know what to do, and did not solicit help. She ended up copying from another child. According to the author, many Chinese children experience shame when they do not understand, and this might contribute to the student having remained silent when the she did not understand the directions. Since the Chinese students were not assertive about getting their needs met, they did not receive the help they needed. The teacher stated that she tried to be color and culture blind, and see no differences in abilities and learning modalities between her Chinese students and her white students (Ruan, 2003).

There were some aspects of this study that were problematic for a reader. First, the results (Ruan, 2003) were from the researcher’s observation and interviews only, and could be susceptible to bias, especially in the observations. As a Chinese woman herself, the researcher could have experienced these types of assumptions as a student and already had the idea of what her study would find. Her strong connection to the experience of Chinese children in school may have biased her toward something that is a sensitive subject. For example, each field note that is included in the study observes that the Chinese children did not participate in the class discussion. But there is no indication of how many of the other students did or did not participate, so it could be that there were other students who did not participate either. It seems like the author is attempting to be more convincing in her argument by making it seem that it was just these students who were not engaged, and omitting the participation data on students of other ethnicities.

The confirmability of the study is present in the form of tape recorded interviews that were coded. These could be checked by interested parties. The observation notes could be reviewed by an outside party, but since there were no other observers, there is no way to check the reliability of these observations.

McBride-Chang and Ho (2005) studied the development of phonological awareness and reading ability in Chinese students, in Hong Kong, who were learning both Chinese and English simultaneously.

The subjects were tested during their first year of a three year kindergarten program, and in their third year (McBride-Chang & Ho, 2005). Their ages were about three and about five at the two testing times. Ninety children comprised the sample. There were 34 females and 56 males. All were in the same school. Most were middle and upper middle class. The native language of all the subjects was Cantonese.

The study (McBride-Chang & Ho, 2005) was interested in phonological awareness because in English, the language consists of blending letters for each sound, while in Chinese the smallest unit of sound is the syllable. There are different characters for all the syllables, while English uses the same letters to make many sounds. Since a review of the literature showed that student’s phonological awareness most often comes from their native language and transfers to their second language, the researchers were interested in how this would work in languages with different phonological structures.

In the classrooms, students were not taught to decode English words, but rather they read the whole word, sometimes called word attack (McBride-Chang & Ho, 2005). They would look at the word and say it, and try to remember it that way. This is more similar to the use of a character than breaking a word down into individual phonemes. In the two years that elapsed between testing time one and testing time two, students were expected to learn “approximately 150 to 200 Chinese characters and… [be able to] read some short phrases and sentences in Chinese. In addition, K3 [students in their third year of kindergarten] children can recognize about 50 to 80 isolated English words but few phrases or sentences” (McBride-Chang & Ho, 2005, p. 124).

In order for assessments to match over languages, students were asked to do a syllable deletion task instead of a phoneme deletion task, because in Chinese they would have to delete an entire syllable (McBride-Chang & Ho, 2005). For this, compound words with one syllable words were used, such as hotdog. At the first testing time, students were tested individually, but at time two they were tested in groups of 30, and then interviewed individually. The tests of English ability were only given at time two, because the students had had no English instruction before the first testing time. Students were assessed on several measures, including Chinese vocabulary, ability to identify the English alphabet, English words, and Chinese characters, ability to delete syllables, ability to hold a series of numbers in their verbal memory, quickly recalling names of pictured items, and the accuracy of students invented spelling in English.

The study (McBride-Chang & Ho, 2005) found that the students ability in reading Chinese and reading English at time two was not related in any way to the English phonological assessments from time one. Chinese phonological skills were stronger predictors of ability. Even English word identification was better predicted by the Chinese character identification at the first testing time. Basically, the skills in the first language were stronger predictors of success in both languages than skills in the second language predicting success in that same language.

The findings of this study (McBride-Chang & Ho, 2005) are dependable, as they concur with other studies that have shown students use the phonological skills from their first language to process and learn a second language, and that the ability to read in the second language is based on phonological awareness in language one. The study could be confirmed, because the information and results are provided. The study could be transferable to understanding other schools in China that teach both Cantonese and English, but I am not sure how well they can be transferred to a mixed ethnicity classroom, or even an ESL class taught in English in America. The study includes aspects that could inform teaching reading in a multicultural classroom, but the setting of the study and purpose for learning English were different, so it can’t be applied specifically to the question of this paper.

Steffensen, Goetz, and Cheng, (1999) explored the impact of cultural background and imagery when subjects read in their native language and in a second language, in this case English. The sample in this case consisted of much older individuals than is the focus of this paper, but there are some aspects than can be generalized to second language learners of all ages.

The study (Steffensen, et al., 1999) cites a review of the literature showing the importance of cultural background on reading comprehension and enjoyment. They state that when reading, people “comprehend more and give more appropriate elaborations to texts based on their own culture; they comprehend less and intrude inappropriate information form their on culture, with distortions of the content, when reading a text based on an unfamiliar culture” (Steffensen, et al., 1999, p. 302). They also suggest that emotional reactions to texts can keep students interested in reading in their second language. Because often students need much practice in reading in a language to become proficient, it is important that students are motivated to read, which interest and emotional response promote.

The basis for the study (Steffensen, et al., 1999) is the idea that when reading, there is a dual coding process that makes not only a linguistic representation of the words, but also makes mental images of what is being read. These can be visual (most often) but also can be auditory, olfactory, tactile, and even relating to the way something tastes. An example given is “when the sight of a dog elicits the name of the animal, or when the word dog elicits an image of a favorite pet” (Steffensen, et al., 1999, p. 304). The question here is: how do these nonverbal images occur in first language and second language readers?

The sample (Steffensen, et al., 1999) included 24 people who spoke Chinese as a first language, most (21) spoke Mandarin. All were graduate students who attended universities in the Midwest. They had been in the United States from one to five years, and had been speaking English for at least ten. Most subjects were 25 or older. 12 subjects were men, and 12 were women. This sample is highly educated, was more familiar with English than many beginning bilingual readers, but their reading behaviors are educative nonetheless.

The participants (Steffensen, et al., 1999) were randomly assigned either the Chinese or the English group. They were asked to read a letter which described a train trip in China. This is the main mode of transportation there and many people had strong feelings about the topic.  All but one of the subjects had had extensive personal experience with the system, and the one who did not felt it was exaggerated while all the others verified it with strong emotions. The letter was written in Chinese, translated into English, then retranslated back into Chinese and compared to the original version to make sure it had been translated into English properly. Instructions were given, and responses taken, in the language the students read in.

Results included the finding that students in both languages reported about the same number of images, number of emotional responses, and type of emotional responses (Steffensen, et al., 1999).  They found that for both groups, the majority of responses were related to one specific piece of the text, 75% for English speakers and 77% for the Chinese. It took students reading in English almost twice as long, on average, to complete the passage. Chinese readers’ mean was 4.73 minutes, while English readers had a mean of 8.9 minutes. This indicated that students who do not read well, no matter if they are ESL or not, may be just as successful at comprehending when reading if given enough time. It shows that high levels of “fluency” are not necessary for students to understand and be engaged in texts.

When the subjects (Steffensen, et al., 1999) were asked to describe their emotional responses, most of them were related to the text (just under 60%), or closely related with background knowledge of the situation (approximately 40% for both groups). There were only a few variations that did not make sense given the text.

Because the English group took more time to read, they were able to focus on the meaning and create the visual images that might not be possible if they were rushed through the text.

The researchers conclude “texts that elicit emotional responses from their readers and a high level of imagery in several modalities are likely to result in increased engagement” (Steffensen, et al., p. 319). I wonder here why no group was given a text that perhaps they did not have a background for, to see what the mental images and emotional responses would be to that. There is nothing to compare it to here, and the conclusion that texts that elicit emotional response increase engagement cannot be internally valid if readers cannot compare the engagement in reading different types of texts, only one was used here.

In summary, Ruan (2003) showed that in some situations, Chinese American students are not assertive about getting their needs met, and so don’t receive the help they need. McBride-Chang and Ho (2005) found that skills in the native language of students are stronger predictors of success in a second language. Also, they found that the character system is more comparable to using the syllable as the smallest unit of sound, so students may not be able to segment words into individual phonemes. Steffensen, et al. (1999) found that subjects reading in a second language got as much of an emotional response, and comprehended as much, as those reading in their native tongue even though they may have taken longer to complete a reading.