The Effects of Adjunct Questions and Feedback on Improving the Reading Comprehension Skills of Learning-Disabled Adolescents.

Adjunct question research has typically focused on the effects of adjunct questions on improving the learning of college students. This study investigated the effects of inserted and massed postquestions (inference, main idea, and detail), with and without feedback, on improving the comprehension skills of adolescents labeled as reading disabled. Students practiced using adjunct questions for 6 weeks. The results suggested that inserted questions (and to a lesser extent massed postquestions) were beneficial in improving the comprehension of texts that did not contain adjunct questions. Specifically, the results indicated that (a) inserted questions were more effective than massed postquestions or no questions, (b) massed postquestions were more effective than no questions, and (c) the effects of inserted questions on comprehension increased over the time of treatment. The beneficial effects of feedback were limited to inference and main idea questions. Copyright 2001 Academic Press.