Previous studies show that 7-8-year-old poor comprehenders differ from good comprehenders, matched in age and decoding skill, primarily in their failure to make highlevel inferences, despite adequate text recall. The impact of inference awareness training on reading comprehension in two such groups was compared with the effects of two other treatments. Inference-trained children were instructed over 4 weeks in making inferences from text and generating questions. Other groups were trained either in rapid decoding or in standard comprehension exercises. Less skilled comprehenders given inference training improved significantly more than those given decoding practice, and slightly, but not significantly, more than those given comprehension exercises. Skilled comprehenders showed little improvement regardless of treatment condition. The results are discussed in relation to possible sources of comprehension failure, and implications for remediation.
In a series of studies of children with adequate decoding skills, but poor reading comprehension, Oakhill (1982comprehension, Oakhill ( , 1984) ) has shown that such children have specific deficits in constructive memory and inference skills. Poor comprehenders were compared with good comprehenders, who were similar in decoding skill, but superior in comprehension skill. This method of subject selection prevents comprehension skill being confounded with differences in decoding abilities. However, as Campione and Armbruster (1984) point out, when investigating the source of such deficits one cannot totally rule out the possibility that there is some crucial aspect of decoding, not measured by the tests used, that differentiates between the two groups, and might therefore explain the differences found. One way of testing this possibility is to gain convergent evidence using a training study. If less skilled comprehenders can be trained in the skills they are claimed to lack, then they should show improvements in comprehension skill. Campione and Armbruster describe several different possible outcomes of such a study, comparing trained and untrained children in deficient and normal groups. The outcome that points most clearly to the causal role of the trained skills is achieved when trained less skilled comprehenders improve to the level of skilled comprehenders, and skilled comprehenders remain at the same high level of