Comprehension-Based Silent Reading Rates: What Do We Know? What Do We Need to Know?

Summary of Findings:

This paper reviews research on the development of silent reading habits and examines instructional practices that can lead to good reading efficiency and strong comprehension. The authors argue that what can be accomplished in digital contexts, such as instantaneously adjusting scaffolds and text difficulty in response to student performance, allows for “precision in scaffolding that is difficult to achieve in a classroom setting or even a tutoring one.”

“The fact that the yearlong gains made by the primarily low achieving students in this silent reading intervention were substantially larger than the mean overall gains at the state and district levels is noteworthy.”