Evidence-based strategies for improving the reading comprehension of secondary students: Implications for students with learning disabilities. Learning Disabilities Research & Practice

Reading comprehension is a complex skill that places significant demands on students, be-ginning with elementary school and continuing through the secondary grades. In this article, we provide an overview of possible factors associated with problems in reading comprehen-sion among secondary students with learning disabilities. Discussion underscores the fact that comprehension problems are evidenced by a heterogeneous group of students. We argue that it is important for teachers to align an intervention with a specific area of difficulty (e.g., teaching prefixes and suffixes to increase reading vocabulary). We highlight research-based interventions advocated by the National Reading Panel and offer ways that teachers can match specific strategies with the individual needs of students with problems in reading comprehen-sion. Finally, we emphasize that whatever strategy is selected, it should be structured, explicit, scaffolded, and intense (Williams et al., 2005). Reading comprehension has been defined as the process that excerpts and, at the same time, creates meaning by having the student interact and be involved with written language (Shanahan et al., 2010). According to Durkin (1993), it has come to be known as the “essence of reading. ” Reading com-prehension requires the reader to make connections with the text and, in addition, to the reader’s prior knowledge (van de Broek, Rapp, & Kendeau, 2005). It is a complex task that in-volves a range of language and cognitive processes and skills that students must master in order to make sense of writ